First print — 0707 box, Made in U.S.A.

The date code does the work here too. The back reads 0707 Part No. X13-65797-01 — July 2007, two months before the game reached shelves on 25 September 2007.

Then check the line under the UPC: Made in U.S.A.

Everything inside is dated, and all of it agrees:

• Instruction booklet 0907 Part No. X13-65795-02 — September 2007.
• Game Controls poster 0707 Part No. X13-73196-01.
• Game disc 0707 Part No. X13-98671-01.
• A Halo Wars promo sheet, for a game that was still eighteen months away.

Item number 9UE-00001, UPC 882224444477. No Platinum Hits banner.

The disc places nothing. Redump holds one USA dump, serial MS-2022, and it covers the standard release, Classics, Platinum Hits, the Limited Edition and the Legendary Edition. Every tell on this game is on the packaging.

Halo 3 took $170 million in the United States on its first day, a record for a game's opening 24 hours at the time, so a launch-print copy is a common object. Rarity stays Unknown because commonness is not a count.

One loose end. VGCollect also lists a box reading Made in USA — without the periods — carrying the same part number and no recorded date code. That may be a second printing or it may be a second entry for this same box; nothing read here settles it, so there is no separate record for it. A photograph of a "Made in USA" box's date code would answer it.

Also wanted: the Halo Wars promo sheet's own part number, which would date the packing the way the booklet dates it.

Source: Desk research across public catalogs and disc databases — Brandon Green (from VGCollect, Redump, Halopedia, Wikipedia and PriceCharting, October 2026).