All the people convinced that AC Shadows is going to sell extremely well (above 10 million) seem to forget that:
1 - There's been mainline AC games that flopped during release, like Unity and then Rogue. AC Shadows selling 1 million copies at $70 and then 9 million at $15 discount bin means the game didn't really sell well, and that's what happened with Unity and Rogue.
2 - There are way more AAA AC-esque games/franchises now than there's ever been.
3 - Pre-release blowback on this scale never happened for an AC game before.
4 - The game will always live under the shadow of a Ghost of Tsushima, which recently got a PC release and its sequel is probably going to shit on AC Shadows' parade by getting its announcement this year.
5 - Given the massive scale of these games and all the budget bloating that happened during covid, it's very possible that 10 million sales aren't enough to recoup the investment.
Again, AC Unity's sales flop happened after the massive sales success and momentum created by AC 3 and IV Black Flag. Nothing is too big to fail and the gaming History is filled with such examples (Halo Infinite, Saints Row, Wolfenstein Youngblood, etc.).