These sales are legendary

Earlier this week we reported that Monster Hunter 4 had surged to number one in the Japanese charts, selling an outstanding 1,715,060 units at physical retail in just two days.

Those figures were impressive, but Media Create has estimated that the latest release may have enjoyed the biggest-selling debut in the series' history. The honour has belonged to Monster Hunter Portable 3rd on PSP, which sold 1.951 million units in its opening week — over five days as opposed to the two days enjoyed by Monster Hunter 4 — but estimates of download sales may take the latest entry past that total. It's been reported that retailers sold around 155,000 download card for Monster Hunter 4, and it's estimated that roughly 100,000 further copies have been sold directly on the eShop, taking its loose total to around 1.97 million sales, creeping past the PSP title's debut with three less days on the market.

These figures are further proof, not that it was needed, that Monster Hunter 4 has enjoyed an outstanding start in Japan. Even accounting for a steep drop after its hotly anticipated debut, Capcom's target of 2.8 million sales before 31st March 2014 is looking like a fairly safe bet, while this strong performance shouldn't do any harm to Nintendo's chances of retaining further support for future releases in the franchise.

In case you didn't pick up the news previously, meanwhile, Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate is half price in North America and Europe until early morning on 22nd September — both the Wii U and 3DS versions are discounted on their respective eShop platforms. The Tokyo Game Show also closes on the same day, and if a localisation announcement were to follow the end of the sale we would absolutely lose our composure.

Even if that doesn't happen, we like to dream.

[source siliconera.com]