Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that answer the question.
Query: How many copies of Gears of War 3  were sold?
"Gears of War 3" received more than one million pre-orders. The game sold more than 3 million copies during its first week—higher than the previous two "Gears of War" entries. It was the second-best selling game only behind "Madden NFL 12".
A Limited Edition was released simultaneously with the game's standard edition, as an enhanced counterpart. The limited edition contains "Guns of the Patriots", a box with artwork by Yoji Shinkawa, a Blu-ray Disc containing two "making of" documentaries, and partial game soundtrack containing only songs written by Harry Gregson-Williams. The Limited Edition was available exclusively at GameStop in the United States and EB Games in Canada, while a similar bundle with an additional 6-inch 'Olive Drab' Old Snake Figurine was made available at Play.com in the United Kingdom. It is also included in the 40GB Limited Edition PlayStation 3 "Metal Gear Solid 4" bundle.
The game was publicly announced first at E3 2005, by means of a humorous and slightly abstract gag machinima using characters from "Metal Gear Solid 3", under the slogan of "No Place to Hide". The title was described as "essentially finished" by January 2008 and went through extensive beta testing. At Destination PlayStation on February 26, 2008, Sony announced that "MGS4" would be released worldwide on June 12, 2008, along with the special "MGS4" PlayStation 3 bundle. It was announced that "Guns of the Patriots" is the first PlayStation 3 game that uses a 50GB dual layer Blu-ray Disc even with the use of file compression.
In the U.S., "Star Wars Battlefront II" was the second best-selling title in November behind, "". Within its first week on sale in Japan, the PlayStation 4 version sold 38,769 copies, placing it at number four on the all format sales chart. By December 2017, the game had sold 9 million copies worldwide. In January 2018, EA announced that the game missed their sales target as they had hoped to sell 10 million copies in that time, and blamed the loot crate controversy.
The "Age of Empires" series has been a commercial success. As of 2008, five of its games have each sold more than one million copies. According to Gamasutra, "Age of Empires" had sold more than three million copies, and "The Rise of Rome" sold one million copies as of 2000. Around the same time, Microsoft announced that they shipped over two million copies of "The Age of Kings". In 2003, Microsoft announced the sales of one million copies for "Age of Mythology". By 2004—prior to the release of "Age of Empires III"—the "Age of Empires" franchise had sold over 15 million copies. On May 18, 2007, Ensemble Studios announced that two million copies of "Age of Empires III" had been sold.
Games in the series have consistently scored highly on video game review aggregator websites GameRankings and Metacritic, which collect data from numerous review websites. As noted in the adjacent table, the highest rating game is "Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings", receiving a 92% score from both sites.
Several staff members were highly sceptical the game would be a commercial success, but Hiroi promised Sega that the game would sell at least 200,000 units. "Sakura Wars" sold out in many stores within hours of its release. According to "Famitsu" sales data, "Sakura Wars" sold an estimated 205,270 units in its first week, reaching the top of the sales charts and selling through just over 57% of its stocks. It was recorded as having the most sales of a Sega original title to that point. As of 2007, "Sakura Wars" for the Saturn has sold 359,485 units, becoming the 13th best-selling console title in Japan. The Dreamcast port debuted with 71,123 units, selling through nearly 65% of its shipment. It eventually reached total sales of 109,686 units, becoming the 33rd best-selling game for the platform. "Sakura Wars: In Hot Blood" debuted with sales of 142,351 units, reaching third place on Japanese gaming charts. Despite high anticipation, the remake was outsold by "" from Enix (second) and "Dynasty Warriors 4" from Koei (first). During 2003, the remake sold 235,622 units, becoming the 54th best-selling title of the year. The Chinese PC version was apparently an unexpected success, with the first print selling out quickly.
According to 1UP.com, "Metal Gear Solid"'s cinematic style continues to influence modern action games such as "Call of Duty". "Metal Gear Solid", along with its sequel, "", was featured in the Smithsonian American Art Museum's exhibition The Art of Video Games in 2012. During August 2015, Eurogamer, reanalyzed the game's technical and overall impact and claimed that "Metal Gear Solid" has been nothing less than "the first modern video game". In September 2015, "Metal Gear Solid" was voted the best original PlayStation game of all time by "PlayStation.Blog's" users.
The game was a commercial success, shipping over six million copies worldwide. It became one of the most rented games and topped sales charts in the United Kingdom. It sold 1million units in Japan, and approximately 5million units in the United States and Europe. PC Data, which tracked sales in the United States, reported that "Metal Gear Solid" sold 1.06 million copies and earned $51.8 million in revenue during 1998 alone. This made it the country's fifth-best-selling PlayStation release of the year.
The "Halo" franchise has been highly successful commercially and critically. During the two months following "Halo: Combat Evolved"s release, it sold alongside more than fifty percent of Xbox consoles and sold a million units by April 2002. "Halo 2"s sales generated US$125 million on its premiere day, making it the fastest selling United States media product in history up to that time. Combined with "Halo"s sales, the two games sold 14.8 million units before "Halo 3"s release.
GameSpot reported 4.2 million units of "Halo 3" were in retail outlets on September 24, 2007, a day before official release – a world record volume. "Halo 3" broke the previous record for the highest grossing opening day in entertainment history, making US$170 million in its first twenty-four hours. Worldwide, sales exceeded US$300 million the first week, helping to more than double the sales of the Xbox 360 when compared with the weekly average before the "Halo 3" launch. At the end of 2007, "Halo 2" and "Halo: Combat Evolved" were the number one and two best-selling Xbox titles, respectively, and "Halo 3" was the best-selling Xbox 360 title. "Halo Wars" was the best-selling RTS console game, selling more than one million units. The "Halo" series went on to sell more than 27 million copies by August 2009, and more than 34 million copies by May 2010. Tor Books reported that sales of all franchise materials are greater than $1.7 billion, and Bungie's games before "Reach" accounted for $1.5 billion in sales. The soundtracks to "Halo 2", "Halo 3", "ODST" and "Reach" all appeared on the Billboard 200 charts for at least one week. By May 2011, total gross of "Halo" merchandise was $2 billion, with 40 million copies of the games sold. The total amount climbed to $2.3 billion in July 2011, and $2.8 billion in January 2012. Total franchise grosses exceeded $4.6 billion by October 2015, with 25% of the figure from non-game-related merchandise.
"" is the sixth main game in the "Guitar Hero" series, released by Activision to the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii consoles in September 2010. The game was developed by Activision's subsidiary studios RedOctane, Neversoft, and Vicarious Visions; the latter provided support for additional features in the Wii version of the game. Following a decline in sales of music games in 2009, partially due to the large number of music games released that year, Activision scaled back their efforts in the "Guitar Hero" series. "Warriors of Rock" represents the final game developed by RedOctane and Neversoft. Both studios' respective "Guitar Hero" divisions were closed once the game was complete, with key personnel brought into Activision directly for future games. It was initially announced that Vicarious Visions would take over future game development of the "Guitar Hero" series, however due to declining music game sales, all further development of the "Guitar Hero" series was cancelled, until 2015 when "Guitar Hero Live" was released.
PC Data, which tracked computer game sales in the United States, reported that "Descent: FreeSpace" earned nearly $4 million and sold around 100,000 copies by October 1999.
"Destiny" sold 91,277 physical retail copies for PlayStation 4 and 49,503 retail copies for PlayStation 3 within the first week of release in Japan, placing second and third place respectively within the Japanese software sales charts for that particular week. "Destiny" was the third best-selling retail game in the United States in 2014. On May 6, 2015, Activision Blizzard announced that "Destiny", along with another title from its subsidiary Blizzard Entertainment, "" have generated nearly US$1 billion for the company.
Within a week of its release, "Wolfenstein: The New Order" became the second best-selling game of 2014 in the United Kingdom, behind "Titanfall". The game also topped the weekly UK charts in its first week, totaling a quarter of all games sold in the region and accounting for 36% of revenue. According to "MCV", it was the 22nd best-selling game of 2014 in the UK. In the United States, the game was the fourth and seventh best-selling game of May and June 2014, respectively. The game was also ranked the fifth and fourteenth best-selling digital PlayStation 4 game of May and June 2014, respectively. In its first week in Japan, the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 versions of the game were placed on the charts at 15th and 8th, respectively, collectively selling over 11,000 units. By June 2014, the game had sold almost 400,000 physical units in Europe, equating to over €21 million.
Grand Theft Auto is an action-adventure video game developed by DMA Design and published by BMG Interactive. It was first released in Europe and North America in October 1997 for MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows. It was later re-released on 12 December 1997 in Europe and 30 June 1998 in North America for the PlayStation. It is the first instalment of the "Grand Theft Auto" series, to be followed by 1999's "Grand Theft Auto 2". The series, which has led to five main entries and several special edition games over 16 years, has sold more than 150 million units as of September 2013. The story follows a group of criminals in three fictionalised versions of US cities as they perform bank robberies, assassinations, and other illegal activities for their respective crime syndicates.
"Street Fighter IV" has sold 3.4 million units. "Super Street Fighter IV" has sold 1.9 million units, in addition to 1.1 million of the "Arcade Edition" (full game only). "" sold an additional 1.3 million copies. "Ultra Street Fighter IV" has sold 1.3 million copies (full game only, without counting PS4 version) by March 31, 2018. This adds up to sales of 9 million copies in total. Upon its release, the game received universal critical acclaim; receiving universally high scores from many gaming websites and magazines. It has also been listed among the greatest video games of all time.
"Empire: Total War" was released on 3 March 2009 to the North American market, on 4 March in Europe, on 5 March in Australia, and on Christmas Day in Japan. The game has become the fastest selling "Total War" title to date; "Empire" topped British video game sales charts for all platforms in the week of release, the first PC exclusive title to do so in a year and a half. The game was reported to have sold nearly double the number of "" and "". In the United States, "Empire: Total War" and its "Special Forces" edition were ranked as first and second respectively in the PC sales charts for the week of release. The game's Australian version debuted as the top PC game; across all platforms "Empire: Total War" was ranked fourth, behind "Halo Wars", "Wii Fit" and "Killzone 2". Sega reported the game sold 810,000 units worldwide during their last fiscal year period of 2008. However, consumer response was hampered by technical problems arising from incompatibility with certain Nvidia drivers released after the game's development was completed and reports of installation problems with the Steam content delivery system. In an interview with IGN, Studio Communications Manager Kieran Brigden discussed the problems inherent in developing such a huge and ambitious game, saying: "Are there some issues with "Empire"? Yes there are." As part of its post-release support, he said that Creative Assembly is planning on addressing issues with stability and performance, as well as adding improvements for gameplay and artificial intelligence.
Grand Theft Auto III is an action-adventure video game developed by DMA Design and published by Rockstar Games. It was released in October 2001 for the PlayStation 2, in May 2002 for Microsoft Windows, and in October 2003 for the Xbox. An enhanced version of the game was released on mobile platforms in 2011, for the game's tenth anniversary. It is the fifth title in the "Grand Theft Auto" series, and the first main entry since 1999's "Grand Theft Auto 2". Set within the fictional Liberty City, based on New York City, the game follows Claude after he is left for dead and quickly becomes entangled in a world of gangs, crime and corruption.
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is an action-adventure stealth video game developed by Kojima Productions and published by Konami exclusively for the PlayStation 3 console. It is the sixth "Metal Gear" game directed by Hideo Kojima and was released worldwide on June 12, 2008.
With the arrival of the seventh generation of video game consoles, the first "next-gen" "Grand Theft Auto" clones were released in 2006, beginning with "Saints Row" from 2006 and "Crackdown" from 2007 both introduced online multiplayer to the genre, a feature that had been requested by many fans. "Crackdown" attracted attention for being created by David Jones, the developer of the original "Grand Theft Auto", and featured the ability to develop the player character's superpowers in a semi-futuristic setting. Meanwhile, "" and "" entered the market in 2006, and attempted to apply the "Grand Theft Auto" formula to popular movie franchises. Still, reviewers continued to measure these games against the standard set by the "Grand Theft Auto" series. "Grand Theft Auto IV" was released in April 2008 and featured a large, detailed environment, redefining gameplay and even adopted the GPS navigation system seen in "Saints Row". The game broke numerous sales records, including the record for the fastest selling game in its first 24 hours. Since its inception, this genre has evolved to include larger settings, more missions, and a wider range of vehicles. In 2010, Rockstar Games published "Red Dead Redemption", an open world Western themed game. On the day of "Grand Theft Auto V" 's release on September 17, 2013, Volition released a free downloadable content pack for "Saints Row IV" titled "GATV", purposely playing the similarity in the abbreviated titles to promote their game due to the confusion raised on various social networks.
In December 2012, during THQ bankruptcy filings, it was revealed that Relic Entertainment "is currently developing "Company of Heroes 2" for a calendar year 2013 release and a new game with the working title "Atlas" for a release in calendar year 2014." On January 23, 2013, it was revealed that THQ had sold Relic Entertainment to Sega for as part of an auction of the company's properties. The "Homeworld" franchise was sold to Gearbox Software at a separate auction in April 2013.
According to The NPD Group, "Rome: Total War" was the 20th-best-selling computer game of 2004. It maintained this position on NPD's annual computer game sales chart for the following year. In the United States alone, the game sold 390,000 copies and earned $16.8 million by August 2006. At the time, this led "Edge" to declare it the country's 40th-best-selling computer game, and best-selling "Total War" title, released since January 2000. The series as a whole, including "Rome", sold 1.3 million units in the United States by August 2006. By 2013, "Rome: Total War" alone had totaled 876,000 sales in the region. It also received a "Platinum" sales award from the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA), indicating sales of at least 300,000 copies in the United Kingdom.
Group C
"Guilty Gear X2" was the 117th best-selling title in Japan in 2002, with 112,520 copies sold as of December 31, 2002. In 2003, it sold 34,294 more copies, amounting a total of 146,814 copies sold since its release on PlayStation 2 (PS2). Reviews were generally positive, with aggregate scores of 86.14% from GameRankings, and 87/100 from Metacritic. On release, "Famitsu" magazine scored the PS2 version of the game a 33 out of 40. The game received the maximum score from "Cincinnati Enquirer", G4 TV, and "Gaming Age".
"Snake Eater" was a commercial success and sold 3.6 million copies worldwide by August 2005. Although this is considerably lower than "", which has sold 7 million copies to date, critics were pleased with the new protagonist, Naked Snake—who strongly resembles the series protagonist Solid Snake—after fans were disappointed by Raiden in "MGS2". Some critics, who found the lengthy dialogues and the multitude of plot twists in "Sons of Liberty" to be detrimental to the game experience found the storyline of "Snake Eater" a pleasing throwback to the original "Metal Gear Solid", with less of the "philosophical babble" present in "Sons of Liberty".
"Gears of War 2" has achieved significant success after its release. In its opening weekend, the game sold over two million units, and set a new record for the number of simultaneous players on Xbox Live, with over 1 million people logging on to play the game. The game went on to sell over three million copies worldwide within the first month of its release, and pushed past four million in sales within the first two months. It was the sixth best-selling game of December 2008 in the United States, selling in excess of 745,000 copies. It was also the tenth top-selling game in the United States in 2008, with over 1.3  million copies sold. It received a "Double Platinum" sales award from the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA), indicating sales of at least 600,000 copies in the United Kingdom. As of May 7, 2009, "Gears of War 2" had sold over 5 million units worldwide, bringing the franchise total to 11 million units sold.
According to Konami, the game shipped over 3 million units worldwide on the day of its release. According to Enterbrain, "Guns of the Patriots" sold 476,334 copies in its first four days on sale in Japan, which includes copies bundled with the PlayStation 3, and caused a boost in PlayStation 3 sales. The PS3, which at the time sold about 10,000 units in a given week, went on to sell 77,208 units in the games debut week. It was the 11th best-selling game of Japan in 2008, selling 686,254 copies. According to Chart-Track, the game is the second fastest-selling PlayStation 3 title in the United Kingdom after "Grand Theft Auto IV" and was below ""'s opening weekend figure by 14,000 copies recorded in 2002; the sales of the PlayStation 3 increased by a "minimal" seven percent over the opening weekend. Konami has reported that "MGS4" sold over one million copies across Europe in its first week, with 25,000 limited-edition copies "snapped up almost immediately". The game received a "Platinum" sales award from the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA), indicating sales of at least 300,000 copies in the United Kingdom. In the United States, "MGS4" was the best-selling game in June 2008 selling 774,600 copies (nearly one million if the number of copies bundled with the PlayStation 3 console was included), causing PS3 sales to double over the previous month, according to the NPD Group. As of December 2009, the game had sold over 5 million copies worldwide, as stated on page 5 of Konami's 3rd Quarter Financial Results. This milestone labeled it as the best-selling PlayStation 3 exclusive until the release of "Gran Turismo 5". Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is now one of the Platinum range of bestselling games. However, these figures were widely misreported as it also included other games in the franchise. On May 21, 2014, Ryan Payton, a former employee of Kojima Productions who worked on "Metal Gear Solid 4", stated that the game has sold 6 million copies.