The most recent iterations in the Pokémon game series, Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon have been performing exceptionally well in terms of sales, with the latest news emerging that the two games have outsold Pokémon Crystal and Emerald.
This means that they are now the second best-selling “third versions” of the Pokémon series, with the two selling a combined amount of 7.17 million copies.
Here are the rest of the stats for other titles in comparison:
- Pokémon Crystal: 6.39m (as of 12/2014)
- Pokémon Emerald: 7.06m (as of 03/2013)
- Pokémon Platinum: 7.60m (as of 12/2014)
This is good news for Game Freak and the Pokémon franchise, especially considering that there was initially some skepticism surrounding the launch of the “Ultra” versions of Sun and Moon.
That goes to all the people who were saying Pokémon is not as popular as it once was…. the franchise is at an all time high and it’s not stopping anytime soon.
While I don’t disagree with your conclusion, this evidence doesn’t directly prove that. Macro economic trends are very very up right now. People have more disposable income than they have in the past. Higher sales on an individual game in a series in 2018 is not only indicative of that franchise’s overall popularity at the time. You should also consider the environment it’s sold in. What other competing kids’ properties are there now compared to the early 2000’s? What’s the market share of the 3ds vs the GBA? What was the cost of customer acquisition for both games? More sales don’t mean a lot if you paid two or three times as much in advertising to generate those customers. It’s a much more complicated question than “What are the sales numbers now, vs what they were in a completely different environment”.
B-But the 3DS is dead! Isn’t that what everyone has been saying right?!
This is why I always like hearing good news about the 3DS sales. It always goes against those who call for Nintendo to scrap it. As if it and the Switch can’t co-exist for a while longer.
It’s Pokemon. They’ll eat that shit up regardless, also, I don’t see anything note worthy for 3DS in 2018 so yeah, it should retire.
Hm. Cool I guess. In any case, the 3DS trucks on a little longer.
IDK if I should feel sick or disturbed of this. It’s the exact same fuck game from 13 months ago and it wasn’t even as good with it’s linear structure, dull plot, stupid ass villains, tinier region and complete omission of gyms which killed the game for me.