There are a lot of big games this year you can choose from. And it is only natural that some will fall short of expectations as a result. The leading US retailer Gamestop is satisfied with the sales of Fallout 4 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 3. But three blockbusters sold below their expectations namely Halo 5: Guardians, Assassin's Creed: Syndicate and Star Wars Battlefront, according to Gamestop Tony Bartel COO in a call with investors, Gamesindustry.biz reports.
He didn't name specific numbers, but Electronic Arts expects to sell 13 million units of Star Wars Battlefront by the end of March 2016. But he said, that "we had high expectations that diminished somewhat as it got closer, and then it failed to hit those lowered expectations". This is in line with the mixed reviews Star Wars Battlefront has been getting. After the successful beta some critics found the game to be lacking in content. We still enjoyed it here at Gamereactor (read our review). "I think Star Wars got off to a slow start," Bartel added. "Given the buzz around the movie, we anticipate that this game is going to be a very strong game, when the movie launches in mid-December."
Ubisoft already addressed slow sales for Assassin's Creed: Syndicate. Regarding Halo 5: Guardians, which was announced by Microsoft as the biggest launch in franchise history, Bartels said, that all questions regarding sales should be asked Microsoft as they are the only ones having all the numbers. From their perspective GameStop are sure that no game during this quarter "was materially above a normal digital percent at launch".