US Pokémon Physical Sales Just Reached Their Highest Annual Total Since The Year 2000

Hopefully Legends: Arceus lives up to the hype. If it does, it'l continue the momentum that Pokemon has from the past few games and could give rise to a Legends subset of mainline Pokemon games. Legends: Kyurem, Legends: Zygarde, and Legends: Eternatus anyone?

Good news for the Pokémon brand as it won't be going away any time soon, but it does beg the question why game freak can't use that money to add some extra polish to their games

@eaglebob345 THAT...SOUNDS...AMAZING!!!

I can imagine Legends: Arceus selling 5 million pretty easily. Lifetime probably around 10 million.

@eaglebob345 Ok that would actually be sick! I actually think your on to something there, if legends does well, the open world thing could be the spinoff series!

I actually love the remakes, a lot, I really hated the artstyle at first, but then I slowly grew to love it! I think the graphics also look nice, It is now my favorite pokemon game in the series, (Only having played 3) the final boss was also amazing, it had me think for once in a pokemon game!

Maybe I'm liking the D&P part of the game, and less of the remake part LOL, so I do hope Legends turns out to be good.

@eaglebob345 I'd be up for Legends Zygarde. I'd love to explore ancient Kalos. With the 10th Anniversary of Pokémon XY coming next year, I'm hoping GF will consider this as their next Legends game.

On to the topic, I think this is good news for TPCi. While some of their recent decisions have been controversial, at the end of the day, people still enjoy the franchise and embrace them for what they are

Goes to show that people will eat the worst garbage possible as long as it has a nostalgic ip attached to it..

@iLikeUrAttitude it'll easily get to 10 m units

@wanghosom Yeah probably in lifetime, I was just lowballing it severely.
I'll edit my comment to make it clearer.

@Funneefox But I never got to play them on the ds.

😟
👉👈

@Snatcher I mean whats stopping you from playing them now?

@iLikeUrAttitude The remakes or the originals?

@Funneefox Yeah that's why Sonic games sales collapsed when it once managed sales comparable to Pokemon. Or how Mario had a sales collapse around the millenium which didn't really recover until Mario Kart DS/New Super Mario Bros.

The only reason I'm not replying with just one word is because this platform doesn't allow such short comments. That said...

Undeserved

@iLikeUrAttitude The originals

We need Legends: Celebi first.

Solid launch for New Pokemon Snap + strong legs for Sword/Shield + big launch for Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl

Well, at least BDSP has by far the worst reviews in the series, which I'm very happy about.

Contrary to what people believe, and what I myself used to believe, I think Arceus shows that GF is not a 100% cynical, they do seem to have taken the SWSH critics into consideration and reacted in the next game, despite SWSH being a huge success unfortunately.

So maybe the negative reception will be enough for them to never make faithful remakes ever again, Gen 5 has to be modern style, with the Let's Go series, it doesn't make any sense to me to make two remakes in a chibi art-style. Or maybe they will evolve Let's Go and make it an in-between style to SWSH?

That would make business sense, you sell the crappy faithful one first, and ten years later you sell them something slightly better.

@Pokester99 yeah because sales totally means quality. Totally.

The games are OBJECTIVELY shameful technically, you might still like it, but no one can deny they have poor technical quality, this is a shame for the biggest franchise in the world, I and millions of others will not give them a pass.

@UltimateOtaku91 they can, they won't because they don't need to, unfortunately.

Because the masses of Pokémon fans are sadly not very smart consumers and don't vote with their wallets. I thought BDSP looks like one of the most stupid projects I've ever seen, so I passed, I'm very happy replaying Platinum.

I own all Pokémon main series games. Playing Diamond remake now and absolutely loving it. Maybe art style for in game characters is a bit off but in game mechanics, colors and cheerful gameplay are there, the game is simply fun. So…

@Fizza yeah I was thinking about this. ILCA don't do a lot of games themselves, so I assume they would have time to start working on Gen 5 remakes right now.

Maybe this means that contrary to past gens, we could get two remakes in the same console gen? Like Gen 9 2023, Gen 5 remakes 2024, then Legends Kyurem as a crossgen game early 2025?

@HenHiro
Dude I think he’s being sarcastic.

Not a Pokémon fan but I feel bad for fans. Pokémon company makes so much money and pumps out a game with the graphics of legends arceus.

@Friscobay what low standards. The simple fact that it doesn't have Platinum content makes these games not worth it imo.

I mean wtf, the story is terrible, Cyrus is just called boss, and what are those ridiculous math puzzles??

@blindsquarel could be, but in case he's not, I'm here to fight for the true Pokémon legacy lol

@blindsquarel yeah but I'm still very happy with Arceus. You have to understand that we got the same ***** for 25 years, graphics are not the most important thing with this game. Never been this hyped for anything in my life, not for Infinity War, not for Endgame, not for No Way Home, not for PS4 Spider-Man.

I literally couldn't sleep this past weeks because I can't stop watching the 13 minutes gameplay, I'm at another level of Pokémon freak.

@Fizza : That would indeed be nice.

I'm also itching to see what the original forms of the fossil abominations in Sword/Shield are supposed to look like. I was hoping that they would have been event legendaries, but we got nothing.

@HenHiro

Theres nothing wrong with being faithful, thats how most remakes should be.
What BDSP's problems are elsewhere.
I said its issues in my opinion on another article a while ago; I'll just copy and paste the relevant parts here:

"Now what separates BDSP from HGSS? Well it doesn't do anything special if anything at all. You could make the argument that its perhaps too faithful to the point where the remake is so 1-1 and uninspired that theres little point in just buying it over the original games. And apparently some content is removed which gives people more reason to just play Platinum.

Don't get me wrong there is nothing wrong with taking a safe approach, just look at the upcoming remake for Dragon Quest 3 - from what we were shown it looks to be very faithful with a gorgeous HD 2D artstyle and that alone won me over because the visual upgrade is so drastic compared to the original game or other remakes of it.

This isn't to say that BDSP aren't worth buying for most people though, a lot of people are enjoying their time with them as I'm typing this reply and I have a lot of friends that bought them, they just in my opinion are uninspired and too bland for me personally to even consider getting them, especially when Platinum exists. BDSP as remakes could've been handled alot better."

And lastly Pokester99 was obviously being sarcastic.

@iLikeUrAttitude,

Think legends will sell a lot more than 10 million, sword and shield are currently on 22.6 million, and it's a safe bet to assume the new game will not be all that far behind.

@BenAV,

Quality varies from person to person, one mans treasure is another ones trash, and vice versa.

@johnvboy I don't know, I feel like BDSP and Sword and Shield are for lack of a better term more marketable than Legends.
And spinoffs usually tend to sell less than the mainline games.

Legends Arceus is marketed and branded as a mainline Pokemon RPG, and current pre-release metrics suggest it will sell like one.

The complaints about Pokemon are honestly overblown. Like who gives a flying F about a tree? The game was fun and that is what matters.

Besides the people who were the loudest complaining brought the games they weren't liking day 1. It's empty noise at this point

@iLikeUrAttitude,

You could be correct, but not sure pitching legends at less than the sales of the let's go games is going to pan out.

@iLikeUrAttitude of course there is a problem with being faithful, if doing so makes your game bad.

The story of DP was bad, the progression was bad, the dex was bad, the graphics were very limited because of the hardware. Heck, they use the same stupid tiled corners, how can you defend that?

The whole Spear-pillar sequence in the remakes perfectly show why this approach is just stupid, look at Cyrus, is this supposed to look intimidating?? It looks ridiculous!

@johnvboy I hope you are right, but I could see the game just selling as well as Let's Go, because of it's hardcore nature.

@iLikeUrAttitude Arceus is not a spin-off. Game Freak views it as a mainline game.

@HenHiro,

Just wondering where you get the figure of millions of upset gamers from, surely this is just a personal feeling from you.

@liljmoore you can buy a product and criticise its flaws.

@johnvboy lol are you engaged in the Pokémon community? Have you ever seen the user score on Metacritics for SWSH? I think that's an objective measure.

"Surely it's just a personal feeling" lol

@HenHiro,

I think it will do fine, the game looks like a nice new direction fro the series and it's very accessible, plus there will be over a 100 million Switch consoles out there, and this number will only keep on increasing.

@HenHiro,

Not really a large enough sample of people to say either way, and I do see the flaws trust me, but Pokemon Sword and shields 4.6 user score is based on only 3096 individual reviews, so out of 22.6 million sales this is hardly the slightest proof of anything.

As for core gaming forums, it's usually like minded people in bubbles, speaking to other people in similar bubbles, so you are not getting the opinions of a wide enough demographic to come to any conclusion, one way or the other.

Btw not trying to fall out with you, just suggesting the massive backlash may not be as big as some are suggesting.

@Snatcher if you got a computer, you can emulate.

@Fizza Pokemon Legends: Mew. nuff said.

@iLikeUrAttitude I agree with this.

@Funneefox I could have if I wanted to I guess. But I mostly wanted to play it with the HD graphics on it, but I understand that the remakes aren't the best.

@HenHiro How did being faithful make BDSP bad?

The story of DP was bad, the progression was bad, the dex was bad, the graphics were very limited because of the hardware. Heck, they use the same stupid tiled corners, how can you defend that?

All these complaints just sound like you didn't like the orignal game itself, unless BDSP changed the story of the first game. It doesn't have anything to do with being faithful = bad.

And the look of game isn't the hardware to blame its the developers themselves since tghere are better looking games on the system that also run better.

The whole Spear-pillar sequence in the remakes perfectly show why this approach is just stupid, look at Cyrus, is this supposed to look intimidating?? It looks ridiculous!

This also sounds like you just don't like pokemon diamond or pearl themselves and not the actual remake.

@HenHiro I'd echo what I said earlier I'm this topic re sales. Look at Sonic and you'll see players will leave a series very quickly if the quality drops

Look at Mario 2000-2004 and you'll see a franchise shedding players despite quality.

If you think millions have been angered by Sw/Sh. Then it shouldn't be still selling 1 million every quarter and soon to be be the 2nd best seller. And BD/SP shouldn't have sold 6million in weeks, the best launch for a remake.

The only explanation for BD/SP's exceptional sales would be that most the players of Sw/Sh did infact enjoy it and wanted more.

@johnvboy I'd suspect Legends will be around the 10-15million range.

There's a fair amount of excitement for an Action RPG Pokemon, but it's not meant to deliver the core Pokemon experience so I'd question whether it would have the appeal of Sw/Sh.

@HenHiro There's a difference between criticism and just whining just for the sake of whining.

Calling something the worst thing you ever seen and constantly putting down anybody who likes or buys into the hype is not a valid and highly unnecessary.

If you constantly are putting down something don't complain about it before it's released, buy it, complain more, finish it and complain more. It's stupid

@HenHiro
Don’t get me wrong arceus looks like it will be a good game and is actually the first Pokémon game to interest me. But with how much dough they are taking in the graphics are pitiful. I know the switch ain’t the ps5 but it can put out better than that.( sorry if that came off as aggressive wasn’t meant that way. )

@nimnio sorry to present you reality, but LA is a thing, and it's fixing almost everything people critisized about SWSH.

So it does affect games to some extent.

@blindsquarel you didn't come off aggressive.
I agree, while the first area, the Obsidian Fieldlands (the one on my profile pic) looks decently pretty for a Pokémon game despite technical issues, the beach and snowy area look terrible, like a game made by amateurs.

@liljmoore no it's not, it's called consumerism.

I can critisize a product's flaws before it's released in the hope it gets fixed, it rarely amounts to anything with GF, but I will never stop to try. I can buy the product and still critisize the flaws, in the hope it gets fixed in the next product, worked for LA. And I can critisize the flaws forever if I so desire, in the hope the company understands I never want a product like that again.

I will forever call BDSP one of the most stupid products I have ever seen, because the game was released as an imo stupid project, and it cannot be changed.

And I will critisize people defending a product that in my view is a bad product from a company trying to fool us fans. That person's opinion is in my view, damaging to the product I like. Questioning the opinion of a person is not offending the person.

Whether or not this is a waste of time on my part, is none of other's business.

@Dr_Lugae lol do you really think Sonic is comparible to Pokémon?

Pokémon is a cultural phenomenon, it's a part of the life of millions. Many will never stop giving the games another try.

Your argument is very simplistic and doesn't hold water, every Pokémon game offers a completely different experience on the Switch. A person that hated SWSH can very well enjoy BDSP.

I can say with a very high certainty that from the 20+ million SWSH buyers, there are at the very least 2-3 million that did not like the game, and just so you know, based on everything anyone can see online, again, look at Metacritic.

@iLikeUrAttitude I don't like DP, so of course being faithful to DP is bad imo. There was a much superior version of the game, Platinum,
the vast majority of people agree that Platinum is just the superior version.

And other remakes like HGSS and ORAS included things from third versions, with the difference that they already were based on good games.

When the vast majority of people agree that the original version is inferior, being faithful to that version is just incredibly stupid.

Trying to emulate a game's limitations caused by the hardware even though doing so will make your game a lot worse, is even objectively stupid. Or will you try to tell me you like the staircase corners? NPC movement stuck to a grid? You love that as well because it's faithful?

I completely agree with Arlo, I would be ashamed of releasing BDSP.

@johnvboy Metacritic is just an example, go to hundreds of videos, read the millions of negative comments about SWSH.

Doubting that a big percentage of SWSh buyers did not like the game is just bwing stubborn based on nothing.

@johnvboy people that played it say it's very grindy and hard, I don't think it's accessible compared to other Pokémon games. In that category, Arceus looks like it's pretty much what Darksouls is for your average hardcorish gamer, to the very casual Pokémon fans.

@HenHiro

I don't like DP, so of course being faithful to DP is bad imo. There was a much superior version of the game, Platinum,
the vast majority of people agree that Platinum is just the superior version.

Well thats just your personal opinion that DP was bad it has nothing to do whether or not being faithful when remaking a remake is bad.

And other remakes like HGSS and ORAS included things from third versions, with the difference that they already were based on good games.

ORAS also removed content like the battle frontier.

When the vast majority of people agree that the original version is inferior, being faithful to that version is just incredibly stupid.

You should've specified that they should've remade Platinum instead of Diamond and Pearl, your initial comment gave a whole different implication.

Trying to emulate a game's limitations caused by the hardware even though doing so will make your game a lot worse, is even objectively stupid. Or will you try to tell me you like the staircase corners? NPC movement stuck to a grid? You love that as well because it's faithful?

Why are you arguing against something that wasn't even remotely implied by me? As well as putting words in my mouth.
You can't be this serious to think that I was in favor of grid movement and staircase corners, you just can't read my comments or just refuse to. I merely said that remakes should be faithful, I didn't say anything about adding QoL changes or other modern touches.

@HenHiro Your right. It is a waste of time. You have no valid points and seem to be complaining just to complain. I hope you something that makes you happy. Pokemon sure ain't doing it

@HenHiro take a chill pill, my standards are not of your concern

@HenHiro Sonic 1 sold over 20millin copies. Super Mario Bros 40million. They are quite comparable. The only difference is Pooemon was better at maintaining its level of success.

I don't take Metacritic seriously sorry even BOTW was in the yellow userscores...its skewed because people use it to attack big games of competing systems and brands. How do you distinguish between an angry fan or a troll?

Ofcourse there's youtube videos cause there's tens of thousands looking for angry videos and it's an easy way to get views is to validate the rage. But in the end its still thousands when the games.do 10s of millions, a storm in a teacup.

@Dr_Lugae,

2O million plus will be a lock in at this point, could be wrong, let's see.

@HenHiro,

Again hundreds of videos do still not suggest a huge backlash, sales of Sword and shield suggest there are more than enough happy gamers, unless of course you are suggesting loads of people who hated these games, just bought them anyway.

If they counted digital sales the difference in favor of 21 will be massive

@johnvboy that's completely illogical. It surprises me that people are not able to think about the stuff they say.

How are people supposed to know if they like a game before buying it? Tell me? The disappointing sales of SWSH in 2020 very much suggests the game has a very bad word of mouth. The games sold only 3 million copies despite being brand new and even having DLC hyping it up, this is less than many other older games that have not gotten any content for years, like BOTW, Smash, Mario Kart, Odyssey, even Super Mario Party, New Super Mario Bros. all sold better in 2020. What's the difference between those and SWSH?
Those are generally seen as good games.

You are being incredibly stubborn, you're not in the Pokémon community, you're analyzing sales in a very simplistic and non-sensical way. I'm delivering arguments and numbers, you aren't delivering anything and just being stubborn for no reason.

By your logic, FIFA is one of the best games in te world and the fanbase is totally happy, you probably aren't in that community as well so I tell you people are not happy, but the games still sell.

@Dr_Lugae lol no Sonic is not anything near Pokémon.

Exactly, Sonic has NOT been able to keep the success, Sonic was popular only on Genesis, after that it pretty much tanked.

Pokémon has never tanked, of course the games will keep selling despite a community that IS unhappy, only someone who has no clue about the community you tell otherwise.

@iLikeUrAttitude Battle frontier does not matter as much because it's post-game, other remakes included content from third versions that were very relevant to the campaign.

DP is not just my personal opinion, the vast majority of fans agrees that Platinum was the far superior version, from all classic games, DP are one of the most if not most critisized ones by the community.

You are saying being faithful is not bad, staircase corners and grid movements is an example of being faithful being objectively bad, and still you defend these remakes.

@liljmoore you obviously don't play Pokemon or didn't read my comments.

The recent Pokemon games are of an objective low technical quality, no one can deny that.

@HenHiro

Battle frontier does not matter as much because it's post-game, other remakes included content from third versions that were very relevant to the campaign.

Removed content in any case is unacceptable and it being post game material is even worse because thats where most of the playtime of pokemon is going to be from postgame.

DP is not just my personal opinion, the vast majority of fans agrees that Platinum was the far superior version, from all classic games, DP are one of the most if not most critisized ones by the community.

Again you should've specified that they should've remade Platinum instead of Diamond and Pearl, your initial comment gave a whole different implication.
Now it's becoming clear you aren't even reading my points and just want to argue for the sake of it.

You are saying being faithful is not bad, staircase corners and grid movements is an example of being faithful being objectively bad, and still you defend these remakes.

Not reading yet again and resorting to pathetic strawmans.
Being faithful doesn't mean being 1-1 to the point where no Qol changes are added or other modern touches like I said.

Please actually take the time to read my arguments instead of skipping them and throwing out halfassed responses like you keep doing. You're arguing with imaginary people at this point that you made up.

@HenHiro,

I do not think you car see any irony in your comment about being stubborn, their is an element of the Pokemon community that is very toxic and vocal, as to how many people it is we will never know.

I base my assumption on the fact the Sword and shield has sold very well, and despite this alleged massive backlash/discontent, you still do not see loads of second hand copies on e-bay for very low prices, unless of course you are suggesting a large percentage have bought the game, played it and hated it, then are just hanging on to it despite the fact they could pretty much get back what they payed.

Makes no logical sense whatsoever, what does make sense is we have a core niche group of fans complaining the loudest on the internet, and assuming everybody must feel the same way they do.

Of course then Fifa gets brought up, and this further demonstrates how out of touch the core internet minorities are with the wider mass buying market, who simply buy things because of what they do contain, rather than spending their lives obsessing over what''s missing, and posting about it on the internet.

@johnvboy you have not answered to the data I presented you about the low sales im 2020, which proves you have no arguments.

You're used games argument is a joke, that's very irrelevant and shows a lack of understanding how Pokémon works, the game had DLC that everyone agrees is the best part of the game. And even you think the game is bad, you can still keep doing raids and shiny hunts.

Also, you can't find cheap used copies for pretty much any first party Switch game, at least not where I live, they a cost 10 euros max less than new ones.

Again, high sales don't equal customer happiness at all, that's a completely silly line of thinking, as I already said, by that logic FIFA is the best game in the world. That's the ultimate proof that your argument is just completely false and has zero logic to it.

@HenHiro,

You have no proof people on the whole are unhappy with Pokemon or Fifa, all you have is the views of internet forums, which is hardly conclusive either way, as I said people in bubbles speaking to people in similar bubbles.

As for low sales not so sure 22 million is all that bad, there will be a slow down at some point, and it's always tough to emulate the evergreen nature of first party Nintendo games, but still pretty decent sales overall.

As for a joke and zero logic, pretty sure you feel this applies to anyone who does not agree with you, as when it comes to overall satisfaction with sword and shield, there is no definitive data to suggest either way, it's down to the individual to interpret the information and come up with their own conclusions.