Japanese Charts: Pokémon And Nintendo Continue To Dominate

Sparks of Hope JP physical sales are over 80% down from the original, a shame

At least it seems to be doing alright elsewhere

One of the BEST! Up there with PLA.

"A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game... sells 10 million copies in 3 DAYS!"

~ NOT Shigeru Miyamoto.

Low interest in Mario + Rabbids, I guess. Too bad. It's a terrific game. Both M+R games are up there with the best exclusives on the system.

I guess that's what happens when you launch in Japan after Splatoon 3 and Pokemon.

@Vivianeat Yeah, PLA and SV definitely are a huge step up from Let's Go, SwSh and BDSP
(except for SVs technical issues ofc)

@EaglyTheKawaiiShika You could say the same for literally 90% of games that aren't published by Nintendo. I haven't paid more than $20 for a Sony first party game with all its DLC since 2017 (several, like GoW and HZD, could be scored for $10 a year or two after launch, hell, Sony was literally giving HZD away like free candy during the height of the pandemic). Several of Sega's releases this year already hit lower lows during BF than M+R, including Sonic Frontiers, which released more recently.

Yet it's always Ubisoft releases that are hit with these "wait until the price has bottomed out" comments. Weird.

@mariomaster96 I enjoyed the hell out of BDSP and Go for what it was, nostalgia. I'm going to miss the top down era but we must move on I guess.

@EaglyTheKawaiiShika Objectively untrue. At least in the U.S. Horizon Forbidden West was published this year and has gone for $29.99 so often it's practically the MSRP. And, as I already pointed out, Sega is discounting its releases much faster than Ubisoft.

I mean, we assumed doom and gloom for Sony's next home console in Japan and here it is, recurrently outselling a same generation handheld.😎

@EaglyTheKawaiiShika I think this "Ubisoft releases drop to $20 within three months" thing people like to say is fueled by how often their older releases like the first Mario + Rabbids are flogged in sales for bottom barrel prices, tbh.

The entire reaction to these games, which people would be happy to pay full price for if Nintendo had developed and published them, as well as the devaluing of indie games on PC after services like Humble Bundle became a thing really just reinforce my opinion that Nintendo gets it mostly right when it comes to game pricing.

And, you know, I'm the same way with almost all non-Nintendo published games as well for the same reason, so I get it. If publishers are going to devalue their own products after milking early adopters, I'll adjust my own purchasing decisions accordingly.

Yikes at those underwhelming sales for Mario + Rabbids. I really thought after the long-tail of the first game that it was going to be a bigger franchise with Sparks of Hope. Hopefully it sold better digitally.

Can't believe the Switch already beat the PS4 in the worldwide VG sales chart now. Those PS4 numbers are too little too late. The Switch will probably beat Game Boy numbers by the end of the fiasco year.

@Ralizah The whole wait until massive discount for Ubisoft games thing is due to them having massive discounts on a lot of their new releases from Fall/Holiday 2020 onwards soon after launch. Watch Dogs Legion was the first one of the bunch which launched October 29th 2020 and was already 40% off in the Black Friday 2020 sales.

I do wonder if Dragon Quest Treasures will be the game to dethrone Pokemon S/V or if that might wait until Fire Emblem's release in January.

@Serpenterror the ps4 was just a home console though whereas the switch is aimed at both the console and handheld market. So that would be fair to include the ps vita sales on top of the ps4 sales, which would add a further 10-15 million as sony were catering to both markets separately.

That's why the switch sales are so high, if the switch was console only or handheld only then it would be way lower

@Ralizah already the game is being discounted down $10 bucks..

Got it day 1. Spark of hope did not disappoint.

@UltimateOtaku91,

The Ps Vita would not of added that many sales, that handheld was a popular as a rattle snake in a lucky dip.

@johnedwin I've seen Bayonetta 3 go on sale for $45. Sonic Frontiers has sold for as low as $29 this year. Both launched after Mario + Rabbids.

It's like you people are from a parallel dimension where only Ubisoft games go on sale soon after launch, lol.

The rise of PS4 has more to do with unseen factors of PS5. And that most games are still on PS4 going PS5 doesn't give much in return if they have to re-buy the same game as PS5 game. Also Holidays are never a good reading of sales until the start of the New Year and looking at the numbers will give a read on what the trend is or what does better for sales as End of the Year can make or break company bottom lines. This looks good for share holder but for consumer well that is update for debate still.

Two factors going:
1. Switch OLED Model – 103,464 (3,287,166)
3. PlayStation 5 – 25,379 (1,919,558)

That doesn't look like a trend the will be changing anytime soon if a New Switch comes out as then it be a standard OLED and Premium OLED 4K/DLSS that will corner both low powered graphics and higher performing games that demand GPU. Inventory backlogs can only go so far as to why then the next is consumer choices of how they want to game or game on the go. That's the elephant in the room PS has to figure out still-considering they defunded Vita which if done right could be a good investment. Vita had it - but they used proprietary memory and didn't use cart factor and invest in more Vita games. Vita was a portable ahead of it's time but lacked the forward thinking from Sony Corp. to factor this could be their lynch pin to corner the table console and portable console but sadly they gave that to the Nintendo Switch and that isn't coming back anytime soon. As you can see iNdie and Developers now see the light the Switch can offer and expose their games to more people just by them playing the consoles anywhere and that is the biggest Free advertisement Nintendo could ever ask for. I've seen a range of age in the younger to teen to adolescents bring the Switch to public spaces. So that's a small grouping but that tells the popularity of it.

@Zuljaras At this point that is a not going to happen story. They already released the first patch that I know and playing it so far had some minor glitches but those experiences that was mentioned so far - I haven't gotten them or hit them yet.

@SwitchForce,

Even though it does not make any of this right, or excuse it in any way, most of the Pokemon audience do not notice or care about any of these bugs or performance issues, they are just having fun playing the latest Pokemon game, and trying to catch them all, as it were.

I wonder if Japan is waiting on M+R to drop in price?

Ubisoft are probably the most noticeable publisher to a Nintendo audience to slash their prices frequently. That's why it comes up so often in the comments around here. You could argue Sega are worse but there are at least a few Sonic games that tend to hold their value. With Ubisoft it seems literally everything ends up going for peanuts six months down the line.

150,000+ hardware sales for the Switch family of systems?! Unreal.

@johnvboy that's stererotyping of the gaming community and assumed things that have no evidence to support this mindset. That's where people dig their own grave. You failed to notice not everyone has internet access to complain if they have problems. We have to many so called Nintendo experts that couldn't be farther from the truth.

@AmplifyMJ,

So true, and yet apparently everyone is crying out for a Switch Pro/2........... well perhaps the core playes are.

@SwitchForce,

No it's not...... need evidence look at Digital Foundry with it's million subscribers and pretty low viewing numbers, you could also reference the YouTube channels in outrage (for subscribers and views of course), again with very few subscribers and even less views.

All this amounts to is nothing more than a storm in a teacup, and pales into insignificance compared to the millions that will buy these latest Pokemon games.

So who does not have internet access, but yet still owns a Switch, perhaps this is why they are noticing these bugs more, you know not being able to download those patches etc..

Congrats to Pokémon SV! I've been thoroughly enjoying my time with it, and the accusations that I'm enabling laziness with my purchase makes it even more fun! However I do hope Game Freak sticks to releasing 2 new generations per platform and waits until the Switch successor for generation 10.

And honorable mention to the PS4 for hanging in there! By far the best console of last gen.

@EaglyTheKawaiiShika Aside from Nintendo games (which I generally get at release if I'm interested for obvious reasons), I make exceptions for a few other series I particularly like. Ace Attorney, Monster Hunter, Persona, SMT, Mario + Rabbids, Valkyria Chronicles, Shantae, Advance Wars, and Fatal Frame come immediately to mind. I want them to succeed, so even if I know they'll sink in price eventually, I'm willing to take the plunge at full price.

Everything else, I wait for the price to fully (or almost fully) drop down the road.

@Axecon My guy it's pokemon, the biggest media franchise period, even if DQ Treasures most likely turns out to be the better game (even then they're not that comparable) pokemon is still going to heavily outsell it.

@UltimateOtaku91 If the switch was a home console only then sales would be lower yes. If it was handheld only it still would have sold crazy numbers no doubt.

Keep in mind that in Japan and just like the first game, Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope (or as it is called over there, Mario + Rabbids Galaxy Battle) is published by Nintendo. So who know if there'll be heavy discounts like it's the case in the west.

@iLikeUrAttitude Oh total sales DQ could never dream of reaching. I'm talking about weekly sales charts. At this rate, we could possibly see Pokemon S/V hold strong at #1 for the next few months.

@Vivianeat I'm holding out hope for more Let's Go and Legends games. Rather that than trying to pump out new generations every 3 years.

@Mauzuri I agree that Platinum is the GOAT. My second would be PLA, then SV. Let's Go gets an honorable mention because it is what I wanted the remakes to look like going forward, not BDSP.

@FirstEmperor I'm hoping Gen 10 comes on the new console in 2026 for the 30th anniversary. Hopefully GF can get their engine in order by that point. I'm pretty sure they are still running off the same engine as Sun and Moon.

@Cronodoug The game is not bad. In fact, its core gameplay mechanics is so fun that many AAA games don't provide such experience when they focus too much on immersion. Games are fun not simply cuz of graphics and immersion or Switch won't be so popular. Most people really don't care that much about frame-rates too.

Having said this, I still think they should straighten out the issues.

@eaglebob345 Rather that than trying to pump out new generations every 3 years.
So your saying xbox and ps5 shouldn't do this as well or is this just at Switch? Games gets bigger and more graphics come into play here. You can't think this doesn't happen and not expect console makers to upgrade their hardware to meet demanding games do you? Take Witcher 3, Skyrim, and now NMS that is a demanding games yet they came to Switch. And a beefed up Switch with 4k/dlss will more then compensate for this issue. So hardware will progress to meet the demands otherwise they go broke like Atari - where did they go or Stadia.

@SwitchForce I meant specifically Game Freak with Pokémon games. GF needs to focus on polishing their games rather than rushing new generations and having multiple releases a year. My comments had nothing to do with hardware.

@eaglebob345 The reply made is sound like only one company/developer was at fault for games and consoles for what it's worth.

@SwitchForce Regardless, I didn't say anything about consoles or any company other than GF. All three of my comments in a row were specifically referencing Pokémon. However, Nintendo takes a more hands-off approach concerning Pokémon and Creatures in more of a support studio for mainline Pokémon games. Knowing the TPC, GF, Nintendo, and Creatures let ILCA handle BDSP tells me that it is GF's fault that they worked on both PLA and SV that released this year. They didn't have to overload themselves. They should have had another company handle one of the projects, spaced out their projects better, or expanded and trained their team to better handle both projects. We've all seen how great Switch games can look when the dev team puts in that extra effort, especially in those third-party exclusives like MHR and MHS2 which both also released on Switch in the same year.

@EaglyTheKawaiiShika Mario + Rabbids is published by Nintendo in Japan. It won't drop in price anywhere close to as much.

@EaglyTheKawaiiShika It's original price of 6500 yen is 47 dollars. 5600 yen is 40 dollars but they didn't actually lower the price by much and that's just Amazon. They do that with all games.

@EaglyTheKawaiiShika On Amazon Germany, since I live in Germany, all Nintendo games drop off in price shortly after launch to mostly around 45€ or 50€ from the original 60€. On Amazon US though they're mostly just a few dollars cheaper with Pokémon S/V being $57 and $54 right now.