Vidgame companies try to stay as tightlipped as they can about sales, except when they have a huge hit.

So it's no surprise we heard from Nintendo today that "Super Smash Bros. Brawl" has sold a boffo (as we say at Variety) 1.4 million units in just its first week on sale.

That's a truly astronomical number, especially considering that this is a game that is pretty much targeted at the hardcore gamer audience (who else gets excited by seeing Pikachu take on Sonic?) and it's launching well out of the holiday sales period, when most videogames are sold.

By comparison, "Super Mario Galaxy" sold 500,000 units in its first week in November.

Given all that, it's no surprise, if still impressive, that "Smash Bros. Brawl" is now the fastest selling game in the Nintendo's history in North America. It's well on track to outsell "Super Smash Bros. Melee," which eventually sold 7 million units and was the biggest game for GameCube.

It's worth keeping in mind, however, that this is huge but not quite HUGE. "Halo 3," for example, sold over 2.5 million units on its first day in the U.S. and over 5 million in its first week worldwide.