I really hope they're not making these decisions with that 10 million figure in mind, because there is no way in hell they're hitting that.
Totally disagree, I think it's a very plausible goal when talking about "lifetime" sales (I'm thinking ~5 years from release rather than literal lifetime sales, because they probably aren't banking on making money back from this game ~15 years from release). IF it gets a positive reception, I can see it performing similarly to MGSV or Witcher 3 (non-bethesda open world games). It would probably sell ~1-1.2M in Japan during launch month (just a guess, I'm not super great at keeping up with Media Create Sales numbers), and in the west I can see it selling 3-5M on PS4 in the first month (probably closer to 3.5M with decent reviews, 4.2M or higher with great reviews), and 200,000 to 500,000 on Xbone.
For the PC version, I'm really not sure what numbers to expect. Based on how well the previous FF games have sold, I'm guessing 300,000 to 700,000 in the first year (Not sure what first month numbers of the PC releases were, so I'm guessing 12 month sales numbers). But I think it's important to note that Squeenix has never very heavily advertised their PC releases, often keeps things like release dates unannounced until weeks of the release, and then quietly drops it onto Steam with minimal marketing. Additionally, all of the ports were overdue and they had very little hype behind them. I think if they put some real marketing muscle into the PC version, showing off preview builds and giving early review codes to press, and it's seen as a good port and the game itself reviews well, and it comes out within 2-4 months of the console release (this part is probably the most unlikely), it could sell 1.2M+ in the first year.
In addition to PC sales, assuming PS4K launches this year, I'm expecting it to be one of the flagships for the PS4K. They'll probably sell a cool 1M via a PS4K patch and being bundled with the PS4K. If it launches next year, bundles and heavy 1st promotion becomes unlikely, and I have no idea how many additional units a PS4K patch would sell.
So basically in the first month, I think it's very likely that they'll get close to half of their total goal with their initial WW numbers. In the first 12 months, I think they'll probably hit around 7-8M. After that, I think it's pretty likely that they'll be able to generate an additional 2M via discount promotions over the next ~3-4 years of the console generation.
I think there's also a good chance that the game could get pretty mediocre reviews, the series might not have much mainstream hype after the 13 trilogy, and it might sell closer to 2M in the first month on PS4 in the west. That would put them way behind pace, and if that was coupled with a bad a mediocre PC port, and no PS4K this year, they'd probably hit closer to 4-5M 12 months from the game's release, which would make hitting that 10M mark this generation pretty much impossible. They would need to rely on the HDHDHD remake (PS4 HD verson -> PS4K HD patch -> PS5 HD remake) to finally get anywhere close to crossing that line.
So I can see it going either way, but I definitely don't think hitting that number for lifetime sales this generation is outlandish.
