“My expectation is it could be upwards of 3 million people. I think that’s a fairly conservative estimate. Certainly, there will never be a console beta of this magnitude.”

Even if Jarrard believes that most of the participants will be from North America, Bungie puts a new matchmaking system which improves connection from other countries.

The beta will be available exclusively on Xbox 360 (such as the game) and only for those who purchased Halo 3: ODST.Halo 3 ODST was sold over 2.3 million units in North America (source: NPD Group)

As precised by Jarrard and Carney Halo: Reach will have “a lot more grandiose marketing efforts” done at “a much higher scale”: this is the last Halo of the franchise and they are decided to make it immortal.

Natal won’t take part of the Halo: Reach experience, Jarrard commented:

“Natal didn’t exist until Reach was already two years into development. That alone creates issues. Secondly, it’s not the type of control experience that we think lends itself to this type of game. We’re comfortable with it; Microsoft is, too.”

Bungie’s next project will be totally new. But for the moment, we remain focus on the upcoming and very anticipated Halo: Reach.