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Halo 3 was a massive phenomenon last fall, but despite not assaulting the public with a gigantic ad campaign, Rockstar should quietly set a new sales record this week with Grand Theft Auto IV.

According to Personal Tech at GlobalAndMail.com, analysts are expecting today's blockbuster to "easily top last year's record-breaking $300-million first-week sales of Microsoft and Bungie Studios' Halo 3." However, you may not have noticed, but we're really not seeing constant TV, magazine and Internet ads for GTAIV. We see ads, of course, but nothing to the extent of the Halo 3 campaign that was extraordinarily widespread over the latter part of 2007. Overall, analysts are expecting GTAIV to sell about 9 million copies at launch, and all without the benefit of giant billboards.

"Rockstar wants to control the message all the time," said Sam Kennedy, editorial director for 1Up. "They want this to be seen and perceived exactly the way they want. That's why — outside of the official trailers they released — people haven't seen a lot of gameplay footage in advance of 'GTA IV' shipping. They want to build that hype."

As far as we're concerned, GTAIV doesn't need a crazy ad campaign to drive sales through the roof...the game will be freakin' awesome, and that alone is all that's needed to entice gamers.