Nintendo Switch Sales Remain Strong in Japan

Heyy ho! I am happy with those news! =]

As I saw that title, I was thinking. "How can it be strong, when people are not being able to get a switch." Than I realised it was in Japan so I immediately thought. "Of course, Japan is stealing everyone's Switch Console!"

It's doing well. I think it's at around 700,000 units sold now for Switch in Japan.

Monster hunter for switch please!

Nice Switch sales. I wonder how the trolls are going to spin this one.

Nice to see the switch do good in a quiet week. Still expect next week we get more good news when mk release

@Yasume Have you been hacked?

Everything pretty much the same as last week (and the week before) saleswise for all systems.

If this is maintained for a few months Switch will be well on its way in Japan.

There will be obvious spikes as new titles launch but what it is now (40k plus) is a good "base" figure.

To be honest I am not that interested in Japan sales as success there is pretty much a given it being mobile - good to have them anyway.

What I want are N.America and Europe sales info. Unless I keep missing them NL should inform us of these regions every week (or month). Can't be that difficult... can it??

I see the real story here.

Xbox One sales are looking up!

@Hotfusion "What I want are N.America and Europe sales info. Unless I keep missing them NL should inform us of these regions every week (or month). Can't be that difficult... can it??"

Actually, yes it can. NPD only release American figures once a month and there's no body in Europe that tabulates the hardware sales. Whereas in Japan there's Media Create and Famitsu.

double Cross should have been a switch game

I keep seeing the headline with "Switch" and "Monster Hunter" in it, but I haven't seen the headline I'm waiting on

Yokai Watch, Monster Hunter and Pokémon. Boom, race's over.

Jeez, PS4 Pro hasn't gone down too well in Japan. Perhaps Microsoft are planning on making Project Scorpio more appealing for the Japanese market somehow.

@SLIGEACH_EIRE too bad Japan is by far the smallest market. But any success is needed at this point for Nintendo.

@gatorboi352 : "By far?" Australia and New Zealand say "g'day." And even so, I'm sure that Nintendo has markets even smaller than us (at least where sales per capita are concerned).

Japan loves portables, so the Switch should easily be a huge success over there. When it gets more game releases, and is in stores more frequently, you'll probably see lots of people getting one. Nintendo did it smart when they released their new system as a portable/console hybrid

@ottospooky I'm sure they'll see a spike in sales when they release Scalebound!

Oh...... right.........

@gatorboi352
Latin America also says hi. The US, Europe and Japan aren't the only parts where people play video games, y'know....

Interesting numbers. I hope the Switch continues to sell well, and Nintendo unveils some big guns at E3 to keep it all rolling! If they announce Monster Hunter on it, everyone at university is going to be walking around with a Switch next semester. I know two more people who've bought the console this week. Fingers crossed this number grows!

Imagine the sales once Monster Hunter hits this thing!

If nothing else, Splatoon 2 should lead to a pretty big sales boost in a few months.

@gatorboi352 Weird comment! Japan is in no way the smallest market. It may not have the highest population, but it's enormously important for revenue. As an example, you only have to look at a list of top-grossing mobile games - worldwide - and you'll see Japanese titles in the top 10 such as Monster Strike which are barely played in the Americas or Europe.

Well...

It still hasn't beaten PS4 in lifetime sales, so the Switch is an abject failure and it's only a matter of time before Nintendo goes third party.

Nah! - lol

I just figured I'd provide the Nintendoom in case anyone was feeling like something was missing.

Just FYI before anyone read too deeply into this, I still maintain that there is no guarantee of long term success, and that it's up to Nintendo to continue to market the platform properly and make sure there is content.

This time, at least the general gaming media is begrudgingly on board and not actively trying to sabotage this thing.

I always thought it would do pretty well in Japan, as they love those portables. We're a month and a half out of the gate, so I hope they maintain the momentum, but it is certainly a promising start.

@Action51 And when the Switch catches up to the PS4 Lifetime to Date sales(in Japan), everyone will handwave or dismiss it...

Impressive hold for the Switch, despite
the lack of new software releases.

The Switch is now selling more per week than the 3DS was at the same point in its life. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe should provide a substabtial sales boost.

Splatoon 2 is ahead of Dragon Quest XI for PS4 on Comgnet, despite preorders haven't even started yet...

Great momentum!

The Big N sold 69,768 consoles, accounting for 71.3% of all consoles sold in Japan! This is a 3.1% market share gain over last week's 68.2%.

In total, Nintendo console sales for the week increased by 3.8%, bucking the overall market's 0.7% decline in sales.

In software, games on Nintendo consoles held ten of the top twenty spots or 50% of the top 20 chart, including the top 4 games.

Overall, another week of Nintendo domination.

I swear when Pokemon and Monster Hunter hit the Switch, Japan is just going to call out sick for the day. "Sorry the country is closed...playing games. Come back tomorrow!"

I already feel like bosses all over Japan are dreading the DQXI launch...heck I'm dreading the launch. I hope I'll have enough PTO saved up.

@Equinox Looking at PS4 and Vita sales numbers I'm not sure Capcom can afford to give that franchise to Sony

Still, 3DS has OWNED Japan for the past half decade, and Switch is consistently outselling it in a big way now. If that continues it guarantees, at worst, 3DS like support for the platform. And that's not bad by half.

@Yasume That made my day. It's an alternate reality.

@ottospooky The only way to make the Scorpio appealing in Japan is add wheels, a 10" screen and a 30,000VA UPS in the box to make it "protable".

@Agent721 Ssshh! Don't you know you're supposed to tally whatever Nintendo's weakest performing product line is against the combination of it's competitors most successful products summed? You're not judging Nintendo properly!

@Ryu_Niiyama Silly Ryu, Nintendo will never manufacture sufficient hardware supplies for that to be possible

Good news!

The Wii-U sold a few units as well.

I like that the Japanese are hardly bothered by the PS4 Pro. The most expensive and pointless upgrade ever.

All Switch needs for a monster Christmas season an A rating for the next Mario.

@SLIGEACH_EIRE
Oh, I see. That's a freakin' shame.

Thanx for the info.

@NEStalgia I don't know now...Luigi was working his mustache off in that pic...

Awesome news

@Malakai Right, the PS fan boi's will find some mental gymnastics they can twist their argument into why the Switch will end up being the top selling console

@Action51 ps4 still hasent beat Wii sales yet

Pokemon stars and its over. Buff said

The Switch alone sold 1.63 times as much as all non Nintendo systems combined... All Nintendo systems combined sold 2.49 times as many systems as Sony and Microsoft combined...or should I just say Sony?!? The 142 Xbox Ones didn't do much to the ratio

@Fashegoy Oh, but the Switch isn't a console it's a portable and you can't compare those to consoles....The Switch sold over 8 times as many systems as the Vita did...but, the Switch isn't a portable, so you can't compare those.... That about sums them up.

@gatorboi352 Yeah, maybe you mean "by far the smallest market of the top three markets in the world". There are countries where selling a hundred consoles in a week would make that an all-time record week. I used to live in one - that's why I missed almost all the good games in the NES-SNES generations, video game manufacturers basically never acknowledged our existence in any way.

Ever since the PS1 and onward, Japan has always been the smaller market compared to the Europe and North America due to a smaller population.

Sony westernizing the PlayStation consoles and Microsoft being irrelevant in the region also contributed to Japan's decline, but it is still a key market for Nintendo. The 3DS has sold over 22 million units their; roughly 34% of its global sales.

Switch is gonna end up doing great. I don't think Wii numbers are realistic but, 40-50 million's reasonable and would be a big enough install base to constitute a 5 or 6 year life span. With a steady game flow that is.

What caused the bump in the xbone sales?

142 XB1 consoles sold? ouch

Nintendo need to reveal Pokémon and Animal Crossing for Switch; then the system will start selling like crazy in Japan.

@Equinox
Vita numbers in Japan are 5.5 million, that's still bad for a handheld in Japan even though it still selling. Wii u 3.3 million. PS4 stands at 4.5 million, I can't see switch take over it this year, especially when it only sells 20 thousand more a week, switch will get spikes in sales but so will ps4. Eventualy it will take over it in Japan, as for the rest of the world I don't think so, but you never know. All data is provided by mediacreate for these sales figures. One thing for sure is the switch will sell loads and be a huge success, but how many don't really matter, it's all about quality games not quantity

The Nintendo Switch is still doing pretty decent! Nice!

Imagine the numbers if MonHunXX was on Switch..

For Japan, a Monster Hunter, a Pokemon (mainline), and a Dragon Quest (we know XI is coming) will put Switch over the top and in the best position possible, a FF would be nice, Splatoon 2 will do wonders, what else is Big in Japan?

@Yasume It seems you can finally understand sarcasm. I'm so proud of you.

It's still early but, this is good. It seems to have settled into a steady rhythm in Japan.

Nice to see that the Switch is doing really well.

Here's my question:
Does anyone know if Japan is sold out of Switch like we are here in USA? If they aren't then I will expect a spike when Mario Kart Releases and another spike for Arms and Mt Everest spike when Splatoon 2 releases. However, if they are sold out or mostly sold out then the releases of these games won't make a dent.

Does anyone have any idea how many copies of Bomberman R Konami would have to sell to consider it a success. I've really enjoyed the game and I'm surprised to see it's the 3rd best selling Switch game in Japan (I would have expected Dragon Quest Heroes or Puyo Puyo Tetris)

@Luna_110 Hello from South East Asia. Not a native but trust me - people love video games of all kinds here. It's only Sony that seems to have thought to sell their products 'officially' though. Completely baffles me, piracy or not. So many want the official console regardless.

@Fred13 I'm not sure what they expected but I can say Tetris and dq heroes bombed bing time in Japan

Wii-U still better than Xbox-One!

I wonder what does it feel like to be an Xbox fan for those living in Japan. Especially the die hard fans.

Monster Hunter and the latest Nintendo portable system continue to do well in Japan!? No way!

In other news, the sky is turning blue during the day, the grass is turning green as it grows, and Yasume is turning red as he posts more negative comments on Nintendo Life.

New Leaf still going strong.

Super Mario Maker for 3DS is quite the sleeper hit, that is nice to see.

@gatorboi352 If you ignore russia, greece, New Zealand, Australia, and some other country i'm forgetting than yea, Japan seems pretty small.

Should have released new Love Plus already and Nintendo will easily claim Otaku market.

@Amsterdamsters lol pretty much, that's pretty good actually and what they will probably use

So, there's a lot of Switch sales, and a lot of Monster Hunter sales. Now Capcom, where's our announcement of Monster Hunter on the Switch?

First place, despite having low stock. It's always sold out in the stores, if there was stock... it could sell even more. Just imagine a MK8D bundle...

The real news is that the follow up to Nier, a game around 12 people bought somehow got a follow up & is doing incredibly well. I am still in awe of that! (Being one of the 12 ppl who bought the original and loved it!)
Automata is just amazing. Even after finishing all the endings I still can't stop thinking about it...
I really hope Nintendo & Xbox players get to play this incredible game on their platforms some day

Glad for nintendo, but disappointed at the people that are putting down Sony, when they're still dominating, and I doubt Switch will come close to it. Switch will definitely do better than XBONE, and as far as people are talking about the VITA, Vita is a dead system basically, just like the Wii U is. Get over it, even if you and I are nintendo fans, the Wii U was a failure, just like if you are a Sony fan, the Vita was a failure. Each company has their bad decisions and bad consoles...doesn't mean any of them are bad. I've been a nintendo fan from the start, and the collection of consoles, games and even the collectibles show it, but I love Sony consoles too (granted I never liked the PS1). I see the Switch and PS4 doing well in Japan, and I don't see them as competitive, but strong sales for both of them. When a game like Splatoon 2 or Mario Odyssey comes out on Switch, the sales will be strong on that for a few weeks...when a game comes out on PS4, the sales will be strong on that for a few weeks. It goes back and forth, but for someone to bust on one is TROLLING...even if it is just opinions. What would be the comments when PS4 outdoes Switch in a few weeks...the whole nintendoomed thing again???

Anyways, glad to see the Switch is selling well, and it gets me a little hyped into wanting to purchase it, as long as companies start making the games and keeping their promise to deliver them, but I don't want just ports of games that are already available on the other consoles. Hmm...so far, if nintendo announces a new Pikmin, Battalion Wars, F-zero or even Eternal Darkness for it, I'll be sold...up until then, it's a wait for Mario Odyssey to arrive and some other goodies!!!! Keep it up nintendo, glad to know a console by you is finally in the run again!!!! Now, don't let down your fans and screw this one up like the Wii U!!!!

@Chanchozoka I see them releasing a bundle by the holidays. For now, nintendo is enjoying the money raking in...at least I'm hoping for a bundle, would be nice that when the system is actually available on store shelves, it has a game that comes with it!!!

@outsider83 I don't think any XBOX did well in Japan. I kind of have to admit, I never really enjoyed any of the X-boxes. Seems like it's always nintendo and sony that do well over there, but they also have all of the japanese game genres that go with them. Would be really nice if both Sony and Nintendo worked together on one ultimate console...no one would be able to compete with both companies IP's!!!

I really believe that Pokemon and Monster Hunter are releasing on the Switch. This console has success written over it.

@gatorboi352
Are you kidding ?!
Japan is Really HUGE Market for Nintendo since Nintendo is from Japan too.
Japanese tends to Love their Native products. Made in Japan will be Sold Out quickly.

@sillygostly I'm talking of the 3 regions of significance, but nice straw man argument. Yes, LITERALLY it's not the smallest. But it's small enough to not have any impact whatsoever on the overall success of a given console. Look no further than the Xbox brand for proof of that.

@Luna_110 again, a region so insignificant it's not even worth mentioning in this discussion. I'm talking of the 3 main markets: US, Europe, Japan.

@Anti-Matter my point is, success in Japan doea not equal overall success. Wii U outsold Xbox 1 in Japan. How did Wii U turn out and how did XB1 turn out?

That's the point I'm making here.

Let me know when Switch lights up US and Europe, then we can talk about a successful console.

@gatorboi352
There is no Nintendo platform that has sold well in Japan that ended up selling poorly in the west.

Considering that the Switch's first month US sales were 906,000, compared to it's first month Japan sales at ~500,000, I'd say the Switch is doing pretty darn well in the west. No information has come out that suggests that Switch sales have completely collapsed in the western markets after the strong launch ala the 3DS/Wii U post launch periods. I fully expect the Switch to consistently sell more in the US alone than in Japan until the launch of Splatoon 2 in July.

@WiltonRoots Hahahahahaha

@Equinox
True but Sony will have heavy hitters too, it will overtake ps4 sales but not this year. PS4 will be at 6 million issh this year, can't see switch doing that this year in Japan. Switch is new so sales will be decent, it don't need new software every week to keep selling. If a home console sells 5 million lifetime sales in Japan I would class that as a success, if it sells more than that then that's just a bonus. If a handheld sells 10 million in Japan I would class that as a success, vita won't reach this mark but Switch will, anything above 10 million will be a great success. I think ps4 will reach 8 million and Vita 7 million, switch should do 15 million or more in japan. Also mate switch hasn't taken vita market share, it was already below10 thousand before switch came out, last year for a while it was at 5 to 6 thousand, even dropping to 4 thousand, then getting little boosts now and then, so yeah this is normal numbers for the niche handheld of lately. I own a vita just to play niche Japanese games like most westerners that bought one. Tbh though I don't really care for how many units are sold on any hardware, for me it's about the games i want to play, and for me it's Japanese games mainly, if switch gets lots of Japanese games that don't come to vita then I will buy one, but so far most Japanese games announced for switch are already on vita or are coming

@gatorboi352
USA is another place for Nintendo Hype.
It sure Switch will sold very well on USA.
You are Wrong if you think Switch will not satisfy Western gamers, especially you as a Pessimist.
Trust me, it will sold well both Japan and Western. And when the fact shows that result, you will be Speechless, try to find another excuses to justify your mindset for not entertained with Nintendo products.

@Ryu_Niiyama If they manage to make an open world Pokemon game, big like Breath of the Wild big, with all monsters viewable on screen, and have battle transitions similar to Xenoblade or Chrono Tigger, I can guarantee people will go crazy for it.

Imagine traveling to the mountains, or big forest areas, with Pokemon actually to scale, small ones and sky scrapper tall ones. The Switch would be one of the best selling consoles ever guaranteed.

@Ichiban Nier had two versions in Japan. It was decently popular as an extension to the Drag-on Dragoon universe. That reminds me I need to buy Automata still. UGH Switch what are you doing to me?

@CosmicLight I don't think GameFreak and co has the scope to produce something that large as of right now. However hopefully, the success of pokemon go and the switch will push them to make a fully realized world at some point. (I still want a pokemon snap sequel)

hmm, I thought the new Musou game would do better than this though...its pure fanservice.

@gatorboi352
Nice stealth troll there mate, Japan is much more important than casual cod/fifa European markets including, lmao, UK!
Nintendo is firing on all cylinders, MK8 Deluxe is next week and is hailed as the biggest and best Mario Kart ever, chu chu train ain't stopping any time soon despite the moaning of ponies and trolls.

Switch is selling less in Japan than Wii, 3DS, Wii U and other systems in the same time.

Nintendolife: "Switch sales remain strong in Japan!"

@TrumpsHand "Japan is much more important than casual cod/fifa European markets"

Yeah no.

@ottospooky yes I've heard they are shooting for 175 Scorpios a month!

Yeah, much, much more @gatorboi352

@TrumpsHand thanks, Donald.

@TrumpsHand
Wrong, all territories are important even lmao UK, which had the 3Rd best launch in all of EU. Only France and Germany sold more. Japan is important for Ninty but it doesn't always work out for them, look at wii u sales, EU sold more. Another thing that makes me laugh is, everyone hypes up Splatoon sales in Japan, saying Switch will sell loads especially in Japan because Splatoon 2 is coming, thing is it sold more in USA than Japan, there are many examples of Ninty doing better in other regions than Japan. The moral of all this is, all regions are important as each other

@Equinox It's really hard to imagine Capcom not doing MH5 on Switch. It's been such a huge handheld title, seems a bit of a waste to throw it on a home console only.