Do you remember when Xbox frontman Major Nelson posted up the latest Xbox LIVE Activity Ranking, revealing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 to be the most played game on the service yet again, followed by Halo 3 in second and Halo: Reach in third?

Yeah. That was funny.

[Note: Major Nelson has since updated the listing, revealing Halo: Reach to be the No. 2 game on the service for the time period specified, but for the past seven days, the game has indeed been No. 1 on Xbox LIVE.]

Due to what developer Bungie is calling a “manual reporting error,” the latest activity ranking posted on Major Nelson’s blog is apparently false and “well off the mark.”

Bungie itself records all kinds of crazy data and events going on in its own games, Halo: Reach and Halo 3 included, and taking into consideration the fact that Halo 3 appeared ahead of Halo: Reach in Major Nelson’s latest chart, and Modern Warfare 2 appeared ahead of both of them, we can go into Bungie’s findings and latest statistics with a clearer picture:

• On Tuesday, 09/14/2010 at approximately 1:30 pm PST, just a few hours after launch, Halo: Reach’s online unique user count had already completely eclipsed Halo 3’s total tally for the entirety of the week (09/13 through 09/20).
• To account for the same number of online players found in Halo: Reach during that same window (just six days), we had to run the numbers for Halo 3 going all the way back to 8/6/2010, encompassing a full 45 days of Halo 3 play!
• Ultimately, Halo: Reach’s online population for the first week dwarfed Halo 3’s by comparison, snagging four times the number of total unique users and decimating Halo 3’s all time high of concurrent users by more than 65%.

“And here are some Halo: Reach specific numbers that are just all kinds of kick ass in their own right, from launch through 09/19:”

• 70 Million+ Games have been played
• 235 Million+ Player-Games have been played
• 2 Million+ Files have been uploaded to File Shares
• 5,901 man-years have been spent in online Reach games (sorry, Corporate America!)
• 20 Million Daily challenges have been completed
• 709,840 Weekly challenges have been completed
• 165 Billion Credits have been earned

“To say we’re grateful for your continued support would be an understatement. Our sources tell us that we’ve been the number one title on Xbox LIVE for the last seven days. You complete us.”

Is it true? Has the Modern Warfare 2 beast been slain? If anyone or anything was going to do it, it was going to be Bungie and Halo: Reach.

Now about that Call of Duty: Black Ops…

You can read El33tonline’s review of Halo: Reach to find out what all the fuss is about.

Source: Bungie.net