Pokémon Legends: Arceus Has Already Sold Over 6.5 Million Copies Worldwide

what the?? This is absolutely bonkers!

This isn't too surprising. Pokemons sold crazy numbers split between 2 versions of a game. Now that there's only 1 version, it makes sense for it to receive these quick of sales.

Q : Have you picked up a copy of Pokémon Legends yet?

Me : Not yet. I still busy to hunt other games on different machines as I want to play them first while waiting Legends Arceus get some cheap deal in my country.

Encouraging signs. I think given the circumstances (it being a new style of Pokemon, launching 2 months after BDSP and in possibly the worst month of the year for a new game), 10+ million sales should be considered a success and it's already 2/3 of the way there. This is the Pokemon experience fans have been waiting for and Game Freak needs to know that we want more games like this, so sales at this level should allow them to continue this direction.

I couldn't even find a physical copy in stock, which is odd because I would mostly just wait till the last three days to order a pokemon game, only this time it was actually out of stock for once.

For comparison, Sword/Shield sold 6 million in its first week.

To beat that when it's hot off the heels of BDSP and without the holiday season (and in January of all months) is very impressive.

They can use that money to hire more engine optimizers and environment artists 😎

It’s Pokémon what did you expect.

That's insane. I thought it would do well but not THIS well. Still haven't gotten my copy but it sounds like a fun game. Guess I'll be adding to that number soon enough

I’m one of the 6.5 million enjoying the greatest Pokémon game of all time! Seriously though, it’s that good.

Sure have. And loving every minute of it, I feel like a kid playing one of the Game Boy games for the first time again. I'm all digital so I'm likely not contributing to that number, but I did kind of laugh to myself when I was at Walmart this evening and saw it was sold out.

Metroid should have sale this much

Both Sw/Sh and BDSP sold 6 million in the same time frame.

I bought a copy. My daughter's playing it and loves it. I have never played a Pokemon game. Which is odd cause I watched pokemin cartoons. At any rate. I'm sure I'll have to catch them all or wutever.

@IceClimbers : Also worth noting that there would have been quite a lot of suckers (like myself) who bought both versions, while Legends doesn’t have that advantage either.

that's more than what a lot of playstation exclusives tend to sell.

in one week...

Keep those numbers coming. Pokémon Legends Arceus deserves it.

And Nintendo Switch will outsell the ps4 THIS YEAR!

Nintendoomed motherf%!%/×$

@EriXz I mean, we all know Metroid isn't going to pull Pokemon numbers, it hardly comes out, this is like the 10th or 11th Pokemon game on the switch.

To catch them is my real test,
To train them is my cause!

I'll be buying a copy for my son for his birthday next week. He thought sword and shield was stupid easy, her should enjoy this a lot more.

I will say it deserves to sell well. It has its flaws, but in general it's a very good game that clearly had a lot more thought put into it than any of the earlier mainline 3DS or Switch titles. Improvements like being able to evolve your Pokémon at any time, change out their moves at any time, use faster and less powerful or slower and more powerful attacks, and many more are such a breath of fresh air. It's clear that they took a lot of inspiration from Breath of the Wild, from the large open areas to the music, the jingles, the artstyle, the sound effects like the rain on tents in the base camp, being able to run straight into much more powerful Pokémon (and actually being able to battle and/or catch them), smooth switching between different rides, and so on, and they didn't mess it up.

Some improvements I'd like to see in the next Pokémon Legends would be

• change up the button mapping a bit so it doesn't feel as fiddly (I'm mostly thinking of how you need to press X to swap between items and Pokémon)
• give the main character a jump button
• more interactions between Pokémon in the overworld (right now they move around quite naturally, but it would be great to see Pokémon play with each other, or see rival Pokémon fight each other)
• drop the stamina for the main character or at least give a visual indication of it, with ways to increase it as well
• some other nitpicks

I really hope these improvements will also make it to the normal mainline games. I didn't expect this game to be great but I'm happy it is.

@EriXz Metroid do pretty well, it is already the best selling Metroid game of all time and will keep on selling
I want to pick it up sometime in the future

Said it would do well.

Even the user reviews are positive... so what will the people who suggest all critic reviews are biased cling to now?.

Go on Pokémon legends it’s such a good game.

Picked it up day 1. My son loves it so a good purchase but then again he loves Pokémon

To beat SwSh and BDSP despite being only one version (many people tend to buy both versions), launching in January AND launching only 2 months after BDSP is absolutely amazing. Deserved! I hope it can outsell SwShs lifetime sales

This game will become the best selling Pokémon game of all time and it deserves it.

So happy about this. I know BDSP sold crazy well too, but hopefully they look at the two figures and get an idea of what the fanbase really wants.

@johnvboy I'm not sure but they always find a way to shift the goalposts, not unlike Flat Earthers.

A good Pokemon game sells well (Pokemon Legends, 6.5 million copies and counting). A mediocre Pokemon game sells well (Pokemon Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl, 14 million copies and counting). Even a weak Pokemon game sells decently (Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Remake, 1.25 million copies sold).

The best Pokemon game for a long while so well deserved.

I think people are not getting how sensational these numbers are.

Also, the author of this article should have put in the effort to look for more relevant information:

SWSH and BDSP sold 6 million in it's first week. Most people were prognotisizing PLA to sell less than SWSH and BDSP.

These numbers are huge for PLA, hopefully the game becomes the best-selling Pokémon game on Switch, to send Game Freak the right message, and send Masuda straight to retirement, since he was the one that said a Pokemon like this would not work.

@Primarina No game is perfect for everyone in general, that goes without saying.

Even I came off the fence and I’ve only really dabbled with the series before. I’m glad it’s successful so the Legends series should now secure sequels. I wonder if they will stick with this template rigidly for 20+ years too?

I predicted 15-20M lifetime sales for this game. I would love to be proven wrong and to show Game Freak that changes to the formula are appreciated. I do miss held items and abilities, and being able to battle friends would be nice, but maybe the next Pokemon game will be a hybrid of the best things about both series. Whatever happens, this is the most fun I've had playing Pokemon since at least Platinum. Simply not having a screen transition to start a wild Pokemon battle makes the game feel SO much better.

@Bret The good thing about no held items is that it makes it easier to swap out Pokemon and generally streamlines the game. The inventory management in previous Pokemon games got a little out of hand. I think abilities would be nice to return, even if they changed a bit.

But what about the trees?!

@IronMan30,

Those trees keep me up at night.

@johnvboy they just look so bad, like an N64 game why are people buying this?!!!!

I was on the fence as have a backlog but saw my dusty ring fit adventure box on the side so made the decision to trade that in for Arceus. Someone had already sold their PLA copy to CEX within a few days of release. Haven’t played yet but excited after the deeply unchallenging Sw/Sw and let’s go.

Happy to see this. Despite the visuals still being a bit mediocre, this is pretty much what the series needed. A solid gameplay mixup with some open world mechanics. I’m really interested to see where the series will go from here but for the time being Legends Arceus is a blast.

It’s well deserved IMO! I just beat the main story last night and it’s such a cool game.

@BenAV take off your rose tinted glasses a lot of people agree, legends is asuperior experiance

@IronMan30,

They do not look as good as a N64 game, I have seen better trees on the original Gameboy.

@BenAV no game is flawless, HGSS had a terrible level curve amoung other things.

Ultimately the "best" game is entirely subjective but if HGSS came out today i imagine it would not have been recieved as warmly. (And if I had to replay one i would easily choose legends.

I had no intentions on buying it, but after watching a stream for a few minutes, it looked really good. My copy was suppose to arrive today, but the joys of living in Canada during winter...delivery delays when we get a snow storm, so Monday it will be.

Deservedly so, it's a damn fun game

@zombi3wolf literally the exact same situation I was in until yesterday lol. Love living in canada

@Lord Aren't you gonna tell us how bad these sales are?

@IronMan30 They animate wonderfully in the wind. I have absolutely no problem with them.

@Troll_Decimator I really want this game but I'm skipping it for now to get Kirby at launch. Arceus looks fine to me, graphics wise. Everyone says it lives up to the hype and I'm inclined to believe it from the small amount of footage I have seen.

Well deserved!! So mad at gamefreak cause it took them this long to give us a game of this level of quality, but glad we finally got it. This is a masterpiece

After watching the ign review, I'm so NOT interested in this.

@Savage_Joe
Play the game and develop your own opinion. It's not far removed in the beauty department from Breath of the Wild. Also at least they animated the trees blowing in the wind, Gran Turismo 7 can't be bothered to do the same

@Nintendo4Sonic
It's sad that you trust IGN that much

@Nintendo4Sonic IGN is probably the worst review of this game, they say it's empty, LOL, literally they have no idea what they are talking about. The game is obviously not perfect, so it won't be a 10/10 for everyone, but it is far from "empty". Such a lazy effin criticism.

@Nintendo4Sonic You must be doing the memes if you use IGN reviews as a source of reference especially in regards to Pokémon of all things.

@steventonysmith wait. Are you comparing this to Gran Turismo 7?😁

@Arawn93 No, I know ign isn't always reliable. They are often harder on games than others, but often enough, they nail it.

And it's not your job to convince me, guys. I don't have that much time for gaming like others. So I have to look for what I'm buying. And I'm not a Pokemon fan either, this looked a bit interesting to me. But ign immediately changed my mind. It's OK for me.

@Nintendo4Sonic
Not a Pokemon fan but you are convinced not to buy a Pokemon game by IGN? Have fun being a graphics whore while we play a super fun game

@steventonysmith i'm in 30+ hours in the game (and more than 200 hours in Sword) and my opinion still stands. Next...

@Savage_Joe
Please tell me a Switch open world game that has high resolution textures and assets?

@steventonysmith LA Noire, BotW, Xenoblade 2, heck even Hyrule Warriors 2 are bigger in scope and look way better than PLA, and I've played them all in handheld mode. I've already talked about that issue enough in previous articles. I believe you are the one who needs to play more games instead of just pokemon.

Nearly finished with the game. It's damn near perfect.

@Savage_Joe
LA Noire, BOTW, Xenoblade 2 and Hyrule Warriors 2 all have horrible low ground, and environment textures. The switch is not capable of big expensive worlds with high resolution textures. The only reason you notice it more on this title is because you are not be bombarded with a bunch of stuff, Legends is much more laid back and slower paced

@steventonysmith it's a question of taste. Pokemon in general is meant for kids. Not that I'm saying, just kids are allowed to play this. But I never really got into the Pokemon main games. I like RPGs, but it is not my main genre. And in terms of RPGs, Pokemon isn't my first choice.

@steventonysmith "The switch is not capable of big expensive worlds with high resolution textures." On that we can agree. My problem with PLA is that the devs of the other games I've mentioned gave much more effort to make them look the best as possible on Switch, something GF and their more than 1000 devs can't seem to do.

@Savage_Joe
Boot back up Breath of the Wild and walk up next to a mountain and tell me how Nintendo did

@steventonysmith i did recently. So, explain to me how a game that launced 5 years ago still looks better than PLA

@Savage_Joe
Cell shading can hide a lot of flaws

@NintendoEternity It already has.

@EriXz.

Never been a massive seller for some reason, people keep saying Nintendo do not do things for their fans, but keeping a franchise like Metroid that has traditionally not sold massive numbers in the past alive, has to be part fan service.

Amazing news, let's hope this is the future of pokemon games!