Halo 3 has been a huge success for Microsoft. The game launched in late September for the Xbox 360 and raked in $170 million USD on the first day alone. First week sales for the positively-rated game crossed the $300 million USD threshold.

The strong launch of Halo 3 even allowed Microsoft to brush past Nintendo's ever-dominant Wii for the month of September -- 527,000 Xbox 360s were sold during the month compared to 501,000 for the Wii. To add even ammunition for Microsoft's ego, the company announced that its record Q1 profits were due in part to the success of Halo 3.

It's now time, however, for Microsoft to come back down to earth. The company is being sued by a San Diego gamer who claims that Halo 3 is a defective product that causes his Xbox 360 to frequently crash.

Randy Nunez filed a lawsuit with the U.S. District Court in Southern California stating that the game "consistently causes the Xbox 360 to crash, freeze, or lock up while the game is being played."

The lawsuit goes on to add, "Many consumers have reported that the Halo 3 video game has caused their Xbox 360 to crash and remain totally inoperable after playing the Halo 3 video game. Manifold recent consumer complaints on industry Internet websites, weblogs and message boards reflect the existence of the design and/or manufacturing defect in the Defendant’s Halo 3 video game."

Nunez is hoping to achieve class action status for the lawsuit. The plaintiff is also seeking unspecified damages for his hardship.

Although there has been an air of positivity surrounding the Xbox 360 of late, it was just a few months ago that Microsoft took the drastic step to extend the warranty of its console due to excess heat problems and RRoDs. More recently, GameStop dropped its in-store warranty packages for the Xbox 360.