UK Charts: Pokémon Legends: Z-A Is The Smallest Retail Launch Since 'Let's Go!' In Europe

Sonic racing crossworlds already outside the top 40.

BLUEY is not on Top 40 again this week. 😟
Maybe next week.

And it's a good thing it's selling "poorly". This game is one of the worst Pokémon games I've ever played. The Pokémon Company should learn a lesson that people won't buy a bad game without a budget, and next time they'll make something better. I bought this game, like every Pokémon game, and I'm disappointed. Pokemon Arceus and S/V were much better games

It's great that Pokémon ZA has lower sales compared to Legend of Arceus. This shows that a significant part of the community isn't accepting the game's low quality and refuses to spend money on a subpar product. Poor sales are the only way for Game Freak and The Pokémon Company to understand the need to invest more in the development of future Pokémon games with better overall quality and production value.

Nintendo's leaks revealed that Pokémon games have an average production cost of 15 million, with Pokémon Z-A's budget being just 13 million. It's mind-blowing that the most commercial franchise of all time operates on such a modest budget. Forget the billions generated from merch and anime—let's focus solely on the video games. Every Pokémon title sells over 15 million copies, with net income nearing 1 billion, outshining many AAA games with budgets ten times larger. It's absurd that a franchise selling at "Call of Duty" levels spends less than Digimon, which arguably has better production.

The irony is Pokémon doesn’t need a $300 million budget like COD to deliver quality. A budget of 50-60 million, just five times the current one, could elevate production to an incredible level. It's baffling that Digimon has had fully voiced acting for years, while Pokémon is still text-only. With a $50 million budget, we could expect to see better-stylized graphics, more detail, a richer open world, fully voiced NPCs (making the world feel more alive), enhanced writing, and additional story content.

I’m not asking for a AAA Pokémon game—though it would be a fascinating experiment and well within budget. I just want to see the leap from a low AA- budget of 13 million to a high AA+ of 50 million.

How can the Pokémon Company manage this? Game Freak is just a mid-sized studio with 200 developers, which clearly isn't enough manpower to produce a high-quality Pokémon game every year, even with a $50 million budget. The Pokémon Company could have adopted the "Call of Duty" model: involving 3-4 additional studios collaborating with Game Freak to share the workload, allowing for annual releases with a $50 million budget and a 4-year development cycle. This would let Game Freak focus solely on mainline games, releasing a new generation every 4 years. In a way, this seems to be what the Pokémon Company is aiming for with the creation of Pokémon Works, a joint venture between Game Freak and ILCA, the studio behind the Brilliant Diamond remake. With ILCA's 400 developers combined with Game Freak's 200, they would have 600 people—enough manpower to manage annual releases potentially.

We don’t really know what kind of deals have been made behind the scenes. ILCA is collaborating on future projects, but it might also be working on its own. It’s unclear if it will focus solely on Pokémon. I think ILCA will handle remakes while assisting Game Freak with mainline games, DLC, and spin-offs like Arceus. There’s also a possibility that ILCA could take an active role in developing a Pokémon MMO, rumored to be released in the coming years based on leaks.

Ideally, Game Freak could expand its workforce to 600 developers, and with ILCA's 400 developers, they would have a total of 1,000—enough to handle annual projects. These developers could be split into five teams of 200, each working on a five-year development cycle with a $60 million budget, which should be sufficient to deliver a high-quality game every year. This could result in improved open-world design, more detailed environments, better AI, fully voice-acted NPCs, enhanced gameplay, and stronger writing.

@Beny9877

It already sold near 6 million after a week.

In no world can that be described as poor sales.

"I bought this game, like every Pokémon game, and I'm disappointed. Pokemon Arceus and S/V were much better games"

You know if you want better.....

@Beny9877 kind of hilarious how these so called ‘poor sales’ would be out of reach for the vast majority of games in their lifetime, never mind opening couple of weeks. My nephew has borrowed my son’s copy of Arceus in recent weeks and LOVED it, he was all set to get ZA and when I asked him yesterday, he said nah, apparently it’s awful. I think that’s awful. He would definitely enjoy it, I know he would, but he’s gonna deny himself it because of online discourse and ranting YouTubers.

@SBandy1 Yeah. I mean, let's be real — players should expect more polish from a franchise this big.

While I spent more time with S/V than I'd like to admit — man was it rough. I had hopes for Arceus with a more interesting setting, but the lack of ambition elsewhere made me drop it quickly.

@SBandy1 You're right, of course. Pokemon games sell incredibly well, regardless of whether they're good or not. It doesn't surprise me, because a lot of people buy new Pokemon, not "the game." And it's our fault that the Pokemon Company makes bad games because they know we'll buy them anyway. And we know, we have to fight them with our money.
Ehh, no more preorder Pokemon games.

@Filthy

Players should certainly want better but I don't know why they expect it, all evidence to the contrary yet people keep blindly buying the games.

If you want change you got to change something.

Edit: To be clear I have zero interest in Pokemon games, just find the discourse around every release amusing as even with all the complaints people still buy it anyway.

@AmplifyMJ I wouldn't say your nephew wouldn't have a good time with ZA.

The problem is, if it weren't a "Pokemon" game, everyone would think that it is some bad game from a small studio with no original ideas and money, and people wouldn't pay more than a few dollars.

Im still holding off on this and waiting to see what the dlc does for this game and then maybe I’ll buy whenever they release it all physically. For now I don’t think I’m missing much. For me the biggest drawback for this game is being stuck in a drab old city the entire time. The immersion is shot here. I want to catch a Mr. Mime shaking an apple tree not resting on a park bench.

@Striker21 There's a big difference between launching at the peak of a systems lifecycle and the end of one and start of another.

Final Fantasy IX (2000) sold about half of Final Fantasy VII (1997) and that isn't because of backlash against the franchise, it got even higher critical reception. It just that the PS1 was 6 years old and the active userbase was dwindling. The Switch is almost 9 years old. The fact it still supporting multi-million launch weeks is exceptional, previous Nintendo systems couldn't do that.

If you look at LGPE it launched smaller than Legends Arceus too, but it endedup selling 15million too because it benefitted from the growth of the Switch. Legends ZA will benefit from launching even earlier in the Switch 2's lifecycle because its sales will ride on the growth of the Switch 2 while the Switch 1 declines.

I would not be surprised if Legends ZA ends up outselling Legends Arceus.

So Z-A sells 5.8 million in a week and "journalists" and pundits are bending over backwards trying to find a negative spin on sales numbers.

Meanwhile Assassin's Creed Shadows sits at ~2.8m after half a year, and Star Wars Outlaws didn't breach 1m in its first month, yet journalists bent over backwards trying to put positive spins on them.

Really makes you wonder...

Excellent. I'm glad for the people who are enjoying it but deep down you all have to know we deserve better. 28% less than Arceus is a big message to the Pokemon Company that we're getting fed up with cut corners, it's time for the series to reach its potential.

@OmnitronVariant How is 28% less than the last game "bending over backwards"? The number is right there in front of your face and there's only one way to look at it. Yes it's still a big number but do you know how investors read charts? Because it doesn't seem like you know how investors read charts.

@LightSpirit the amount of people insulting others for enjoying the game are as many as the amount of people insulting others for not enjoying the game. Even on here I see people trying to dismiss people’s opinions for not liking the quality of the game. Lots of fanboys will look at the situation from the angle they want to I guess.

@Dylansuxx Half the people complaining about the game didn't even play it.

That's why you get results like Pokemon Scarlet/Violet getting loads of "backlash" yet ending up selling better than Sword/Shield when other Nintendo franchises like Zelda had Tears of the Kingdom sell much less than BOTW despite the fact both games were critically acclaimed.

The silent majority like the Pokemon games. A loud minority who don't even play the games, complain loudly about games they were never interested in.

Fans of the games don't care if these people buy the games or not, but the complainers and whiners seem to care way too much over what fans want to buy and enjoy. They can vote with their wallet, but they can't vote with ours.

Digital sales account for a larger share of total sales every year, right? Maybe that's what's happening here.

@SpaceboyScreams You conveniently ignored the other points in my comments. Like budget and comparing to the rest of the industry. You might have an inner cartoon reality where investors are so silly they only look at an isolated graph without any context, but here in reality, the context matters.

@TheBigK The Digital sales might, but I think the bigger factor is that the Switch 2 is only estimated to have sold 10million.

It's probably just not big enough yet to offset the decline of the active userbase of the Switch 1. But the Switch 2 took more than 50% of the sales despite having 10% of the userbase suggests that Legends ZA's sales will probably increase a lot over the holiday season in a way previous Pokemon games would not.

@Dr_Lugae

Your argument is flawed because Pokémon ZA is a cross-gen title between Switch 1 and 2, meaning it has access to the entire install base of Switch users as well as new Switch 2 users. The consumer base for Pokémon ZA is significantly larger compared to Arceus or any other Pokémon game, as it is the first cross-gen newly released Pokémon title in the Switch era.

I don't mind if Pokemon ZA ends up making more sales as the Switch 2's install base grows every year. It's actually a positive thing that Pokemon ZA has relatively "bad" sales compared to Arceus, even though it's the first true cross-gen Pokemon title. It shows that people are no longer willing to tolerate bad games, even if it's the most popular franchise in the world.

@SBandy1 Yeah, 100%.

I guess the quality is at least consistent.

@Dr_Lugae saying ppl have to play a game to speak out their negative opinions on it is like saying ppl have to fully 100% of the game to speak out their positive opinions on it. I don’t care to argue with crazy fan boys tho tbh. Nobody cares if you enjoy it and are whatevering with your wallet. Just don’t be hypocrites about others speaking their opinions too just cos u feel personally attacked everytime someone criticizes anything you like.

@Striker21 Switch 1 game sales are on a decline, as any other console that's as old as it is.

Switch 2 console sales on the other hand gained a 300% boost in Japan alone in the week of Pokemon's release. Largest boost in console sales than any Pokemon game for Switch 1, and this is despite it being available for both consoles.

This game came before the holiday season unlike almost every other Pokemon game that launched for Switch 1. It will absolutely sell a stupid amount through the holiday and outpace Arceus worldwide.

It's notable also that Arceus came out in the heyday of the Switch's popularity.

Sorry, but your analysis reeks of "I watched a YouTuber so I think this flopped".

This game is one of the most impressive launches if you look outside of the basic sold number and actually apply some nuance and logic to it. Something severely missing in today's internet discussions.

You will be in for a rude awakening on the sales after the holidays, I suggest dropping this strange argument and let the numbers do the talking.

@Striker21 That 13 million production cost was debunked though. That was the cost for the prototype for a demo build of the game to pitch to The Pokémon Company and Nintendo.

No one should really be taken anything that Centro says at face value to be quite honest.

This title is entirely misleading. Physical sales might be lower, however Digital sales aren't mentioned. At all. More people buy digital than with Legends Arceus.

Also the Switch 2 isn't a year old yet. So it should be more comparible to the Let's Go games. Which it is actually outselling physically.

Anyone thinking this game is a flop sales wise is just lying to themselves.

@Striker21 God of War Ragnarok only sold 5.1million in its first week which is lower than Legends ZA's 5.8million.

The PS5 wasn't new when it launched, the PS5 was 2 years old and the PS4 was 8 years.

Also Ragnarok only ended up at 15million to GoW 2018's 23million despite being on two platforms. 35% less, what do you read from that? What were the Playstation audience punishing Sony for?

@Striker21 Hahaha well thank you for confirming that I'm right, easiest argument I've had on the internet.

Fight all you want, it’s all going digital. That’s where the unrecorded sales are.

It’s funny how people are coping with this news as a sign of “gamers voting with their wallets”.

Also, Sonic Racing CW reeeeeeeeally fell off.

@martynstuff

"Has been debunked" by whom? What's your source?

Even if it's not exactly a $13 million budget, you can tell it's a low-budget game by comparing the production values to other games. Clair Obscur Expedition 33 is estimated to have a budget of $30–40 million and has good production for an AA game. Astro Bot is estimated to have a budget of less than $50 million and also boasts solid production values. The Zelda: Breath of the Wild/Tears of the Kingdom series is considered the most expensive games Nintendo has ever made, with development costs estimated at $70–100 million each.

Not that surprising. PLA is one of the worst selling Pokemon games and was not well received.

Just want to say that I’ve been pretty critical of the game in the comments of the various articles published by NintendoLife, and while the game does have its share of shortcomings, I was wrong about the overall game itself.
I sat down and started playing it this weekend and could. not. stop. It’s hands down my favorite Pokemon game in terms of gameplay and presentation so far. They fixed so many long-running series’ shortfalls. I really want this to be the direction of Pokemon going forward.
There are still gripes I have about the game (lack of voice acting in cutscenes, it doesn’t get out of its own way soon enough, the city isn’t alive enough), but the things they do nail, they nail.
I’d encourage anyone sitting on the fence on this one to just go ahead and take the plunge.

@Striker21 I updated my post but God of War Ragnarok went on to sell 35% less than GoW 2018. I don't recall any statements by the Playstation fanbase hating on Ragnarok nor do you seem to believe this bigger sales gap was a statement on the poor state of God of War.

I never said Switch 1 owners won't buy the game I do expect they will, and I explained why think the Switch 1 will skew away from 1st week sales. The more active game buyers will be on Switch 2 hence how with possibly 1/15th of the audience size the Switch 2 bought more copies of Legends ZA.

I don't even think the sales are poor. Pokemon Sword/Shield sold 6million first week and they went on to sell 26million. Pokemon LGPE sold 3million first week and they went on to sell 15million. Pokemon Legends Arceus sold 6.5million first week and they sold 15million too.

Pokemon Legends ZA sold 5.8million and you think it's some grand statement on the series. Hell it's only bloody 10% lower than Legends Arceus worldwide 1st week which means in some countries Legends ZA will have had to have matched or outsold Legends Arceus 1st week for the numbers to work out. (and at the very least its known in Japan ZA sold more)

@Dr_Lugae

Pokemon ZA is seen as performing "poorly" because it achieved "only" 5 million sales, which is 10% less than Arceus, despite having a larger potential audience with Switch 1 users and the newly added Switch 2 users.

I know Pokemon ZA will likely hit close to 10 million sales in the next few months, but I’m one of those who don’t want another poorly made Pokemon game to achieve such "success" and give Game Freak another free pass to continue "milking" their fanbase. Objectively, Pokemon ZA already broke even with 1 million sales and has been highly profitable with its current 5 million sales. The point isn’t for it to be as successful as previous Pokemon games, but to send a message to The Pokemon Company that they need to improve if they want to maintain the same level of success or even reach new heights.

People got into arguments about Pokemon games, but I felt quite sad to see BLUEY was not on Top 40 this week.

Pray for our brothers in Europe. They have clearly lost the way.

@Striker21 That's all just semantics. I already explained why you can't just add the audiences together or treat the active Switch base like its actually has more buying power than in 2022. As someone as owns both a Switch and a Switch 2 you'd be counting me as two potential customers for the game but I'm not.

If you expect Legends ZA to eventually sell in the ballpark of Legends Arceus, LGPE, etc. You can't possibly believe anyone is sending a message through sales. I mean what if it does outsell Legends Arceus in the end? What does that say?

I also want to see the series improve, but I'm going to be keeping an eye out for Nintendo surveys for the game to say what I like or don't. I'm not going to read or push fluctuations in launch week sales that are negative in some regions and positive in others, as a message from the fanbase about the state of the games.

Z-A is simply really good Pokémon fun. I hope the holiday season will push it further, because I like what they are doing with the Legends series.

@Dr_Lugae

"As someone as owns both a Switch and a Switch 2 you'd be counting me as two potential customers for the game but I'm not."

I’m not counting it as "two customers" because I’m assuming you’re buying the game on the new-gen Switch 2. You’ve already transitioned to the new generation. I’m counting the remaining old user base of Switch 1 who hasn’t transitioned yet to Switch 2 and still represents a massive consumer base of over 100 million gamers.

As I mentioned, I’m glad that Pokémon ZA has 10% lower sales since it shows the backlash was strong enough for some fans to withhold their money. However, I’m aware that the casual audience will eventually boost the game’s sales. Pokémon ZA definitely won’t cap at 5 million sales—that much I already know.

The article itself states that this is only retail sales, digital sales not included. We also know that digital sales have grown in the last 4 years, even on Nintendo platforms. Given that the bundle contains a digital copy of the game, I’d guess that the “drop” is a lot less than raw numbers (in Europe) would have you believe.

"However, according to Chris Dring over at The Game Business, sales are roughly 28% lower than that of Pokémon Legends: Arceus across Europe. Going one step further, he states that Legends: Z-A is the smallest retail launch for the 'mainline' franchise since Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu and Let's Go, Eevee! in 2018."

Good. I personally hope that this is because people are tired of half-baked releases from TPC. I am certainly keeping my hand on my wallet for this game. At least until there's either a package deal with the DLC, or I can find it substantially discounted.

There's a typo in the list "Super Maio Galaxy" should be Mario, of course

@Dr_Lugae That is my biggest annoyance half the people complaining about "pokeslop" still wouldn't play it even if it had GTA 6 graphics. It doesn't help that sites like NL constantly been super negative since Feb, I mean just look at this article headline alone and random percentages with no context to actual sale numbers to make it looks as if the game is doing terrible, when it sold 6m copies WW and is still number 1 in the UK charts just goes to show how you can spin things to fit an agenda.

Alternative headline easily could have been "Pokemon ZA remains strong in the UK charts at number 1" the fact that isn't mentioned in the headline just shows where NL agenda is at.

Folks can only hope they'll get higher effort products down the line, if they don't continue to make low effort products so commercially viable.

Shame since I think many of us, certainly myself, had such high hopes for the "Legends" games as the more experimental and progressive part of the franchise. I appreciate their efforts with experimenting with real time combat, but as for the whole package, I will not support that at full price. Maybe that next Legends game wil deliver.

PS: Kinda funny seeing Hogwards Legacy on that list though. That games not perfect, but oh boy did it deliver on the "Life in Hogwarts"-fantasy. Without a proven sales record, they went all out with it. Makes me respect it even more by comparison.

People keep forgetting that Legends Arceus came out during the pandemic. Z-A is selling very well and it won't surprise me if it surpasses PLA sales next year.

@Ralek85 tbf in the current games industry uncommercially viable games rarely get second chances, they die and often take out the development studio with them.

It's likely only through the case that Pokemon is low-risk high-reward that they'd experiment like this. Give Pokemon a AAA budget and they'd probably be solidly iterating the same old formula because even one failure would become costly.

@Chibi I agree with this. The numbers don’t paint a full story without digital included because it could just be that Europe is moving more and more toward digital sales instead of physical. Could just be Europe turning away from Pokemon too. We’d have to see physical and digital numbers as well as other regions to see if there’s a similar drop across all platforms/regions. Otherwise this number in the article doesn’t tell us much.

@Striker21 You described my fondest wish for Pokémon game development, going forward. I just wish it would become a reality. We don't have to accept low effort games like the ones they have been putting out in recent years. There's literally no reason for them not to want to improve the quality and depth of their games. I just don't realistically see it happening.

@Waluigi451 Yh it doesn’t tell us the full story. I doubt that Pokemon is waning in popularity in Europe but I guess we’ll find out definitively when gen 10 drops.

@Bats1234 Agree like take the "smallest retail launch since Pokemon Lets go Pikachu Eevee".

1st weeks:
LGPE: 3million
Sw/Sh: 6million
BD/SP: 6million
Legends LA: 6.5million
SV: 10million
Legends ZA: 5.8million

The shear gulf between ZA and LGPE is so wide that the comparison would just do more to mislead than pointing out the titles its actually sold within a few hundred thousands of.

Like it's sold only 200k below Sw/Sh and BD/SP. But the fact it's slightly below them is being used an an excuse to compare it to a game that Legends ZA sold 2.8million more than.

Considering first reports for week 1, ZA was down 40% compared to Arceus, and then by week two only 28%... seems like this game is going to have some strong legs heading into the holiday season whereas Arceus did not have that. Time will tell though.

37 hours in and still only at Rank E.

@Dr_Lugae It's like saying, this is the worst selling Pokemon game that isn't a Next Gen game or Remake since Detective Pikachu Returns. That game sold 10 copies. I'm the one who bought all 10 copies btw.

Reduced to clear by Christmas.

Legends ZA is specifically targeted with lower sales than it's predecessors. Some of the games in the time frame they're referring to were released during Lockdowns. What are the other long running franchises doing sales figures wise by percentages in the same time frame?

I don’t care what the echo chambers online have said. I finished the game and thoroughly enjoyed it. Although it is a little on the short side and the post game is a little grind-ey. All in all though a very good game tho imo.

@Striker21 Bro you need to go outside hang with friends. No way anybody should be this invested. I hope you typed all that on a computer and not your phone. Lol

I played Arceus. It was an ok game but I don’t really feel like ever playing a pokemon game again after it.

@Striker21
https://x.com/necrolipe/status/1978031053307556060

As far as I'm concerned, I've had so much fun playing Legends Z-A. I had some few concerns but not enough to deteriorate my experience and the game was really fun to play with from start to end and that's really all that matters to me

Nostalgia sells and they know it. Would be nice if they put more money in the production of these products, but they honestly do not have to in order to sell the games. It is what it is.

@Dr_Lugae That doesn't really sound right for a game that was apparently developed (not marketed) in the sub $ 20 Million range and is part of a $ 100+ Billion franchise with already about 5,6 Million units sold. Just ballparking this means: with a median $ 60 a pop that gives us about $ 360 Million revenue in about a week? On what? Like maybe a $ 40 Million budget including marketing? If that is poor performance (other Pokemon games selling faster that is), then we are talking a supremely low-risk environment in my humble opinion, that allows for any kind of risk and thus experimentation really, that they feel like.

Also, by that logic neither Palworld nor Hogwarts Legacy should not really exist at all?

Yeah, the industry is generally risk averse, true, the bigger the project, the more risk averse it generally gets, also true, but then again we need to understand what the risk really looks like.

I don't think they are running any risk of not turning a profit. Does not matter whether the game costs $ 13 Million or $ 130 Million to make. In other words, the risk is not profitability, certainly not viability as a commercial entity, but simply margins.

I lack the imagination to think of anything they could do with Pokemon that would qualify as a risk under these circumstances. Maybe ... turning it into a one billion dollar production for an arena-based Pokemon shooter, that is R-rated, would qualify?

No, the point is, that it would be creatively sound to unshakle their developers with proper budgets and development time, but it would be terrible business. They can and will produce even cheaper in the future and run up their margins. Anything else would be silly, as their business does not rely on quality, but quantity.

The more they can pump up, the faster their line will go up. Qualtiy is not a consideration that can and should enter into their development strategy at this point. They are just doing what the data tells them. They can sell whatever they make, even if it is downright broken and needs a next-gen machine to make it resemble a working product. People will still pay $ 60 and play a thousand hours of it.

I don't even fault the creatvies for that as it is certainly not the creatives calling the shots here, though that is not something unique to Gamefreak. I imagine it must be highly frustrating to work on these projects. Nobody goes into visual design to create a city of ugly 2D blocks all day long.

The only weird thing is that Nintendo used to be a publisher that really believed in quality first, because they were protective of their brand, mores o than anyone else in the industry. But even that consideration is out the window for Pokemon since the jump to the Switch.

Any business on the planet would kill for a product that just sells, no matter what you do with it.

We all know Nintendo's weakest market is Europe. This means nothing.

@Ralek85 5.8 million sold up until Sunday the 19th, over a week ago.

@kal_el_07241 "Considering first reports for week 1, ZA was down 40% compared to Arceus, and then by week two only 28%..."
Reread that part of the article. It's 28% down over Arceus across all of Europe, not just the UK, at launch.

@Chibi These charts include bundles. Bundles are sold through retail.

All I know is that I skipped it for Once Upon a Katamari. Enjoyable game, I've been loving it so far.

@BTB20 Ok, even if they include the official bundle (the article isn’t very clear on this), there’s still probably a large number of digital sales this article isn’t accounting for.

We're just talking physical sales, right? That metric is less and less meaningful these days

Amidst all this discussion about whether Pokémon Z-A is a flop or not, no one is talking about the real flop in the UK market: Sonic Racing CrossWorlds, the MK World killer.

@Ralek85 Nintendo have stopped bothering about quality even for first party since the Switch. (Ever since hiring a money man as CEO.) The Wii U games that ended up getting ported to the Switch were generally decent games that worked properly on the system they were released on. There were too many Switch games that wee just not good enough. (DKCR HD/Link’s Awakening/Echoes of Wisdom) they seem to be a bit better on Switch 2 but it’s not as if they were sold cheaply or anything. If you compare NES Remix 1&2 to Nintendo World Championship that is another situation where it just isn’t right. (The Switch Online emulator for the lost levels works much better than on Nintendo World Championship. The challenge where you have to knock the mushroom over the top is a good example.) Metroid Prime Remastered is the exception and that is the standard Nintendo used to be known for.

@DanieK I have not enjoyed Mario Kart World at all yet. (I have been playing it but I wouldn’t have bothered with it at all if I could have got a Switch 2 with DK at the same price.) I did enjoy the Cross Worlds network test on Series X because it actually plays like a new game. (I have not got it yet because I don’t agree with the way the DLC is being done.) For it’s full price Mario Kart World should have had the amount of content Kirby Air Ride has.

Anyone think this is a game worth buying or should I just hold off?

Hahahaha good. About time people stop accepting this lazy level of quality from the world's biggest franchise.

@Ralek85 That's true, Palworld wouldn't exist if it failed in fact the only reason it released into early access when it did was because Pocketpair couldn't afford to develop it any longer without any income from it. Hogwarts Legacy is a generic open world game so I don't know why you'd name drop it.

In this industry of constant studio shut downs even by its biggest publishers, chaos and layoffs at places like Microsoft, Sony, Ubisoft, Activison, I don't know why you would doubt me saying the AAA games are risky.

@Lemontree 5.8m sales in a short period of time is one hell of a big NO to the franchise.

@Dr_Lugae I was totally agreeing with you.

I was just pointing out, that the record shows that this is not true for Pokemon games. It's about as true for Pokemon games in fact as it is for Call of Duty games for example (where the pertinent questio is, whether the game will be the best seller of it's respective release year, but not if it will turn a significant profit), even though these operate at a completely different budget level. Just goes to show that talking about any business risk involved for Gamefreak by e.g. tenfolding the budget of something like Legends Z-A is simply not borne out by any available facts.

Again, it's just funny to me, because I definitely feel something like FE would carry a relevant risk, given the series was on it's last leg with Awakenking. Yet, Fire Emblem does get a fully modelled Garreg Mach with fully voiced no-name Monks. Not sure what else one could say on this, as all of this strikes me as super obvious: Legends was not a safety play to mitigate risk, it was margins play 🤑

How is that not a substaniated and fair assessment? Oo

@h3s That's fair, the last time Nintendo was the top-ranked publishers on metacritic for example (not that this is necessarily a be all and end all metric) was 2015 afaik. Something definitely shifted in the years after. To be fair though, the WiiU must have been a big system shock to them.

@BTB20 Yeah, I was just saying it just came out and it is already turning a huge profit (and yeah, I am aware that revenue does not equal profit for the developer, but at this kind of sales it does not matter). I was just trying to illustrate that the kind of budget Legends Z-A received has zero to do with risk mitigation and all to do with running up their margins.

Pokemon - for some reason - seems to be a very inelastic product, more like a captive product really. There is a huge built-in audience, that is not motivated by cost or quality. Or maybe it is more like Cigarettes in feeding a legal addiction?

I don't know, but there is no point in looking at it like any other games franchise. It very obviously does not operate on the same terms. As I said before, that would be like Activision doing FEWER CoD games, because they are worried about quality or even losses. It would be insane and shareholders would riot: more games is better for profits, not better games is better for profit. If you can do both, great, if you cannot, do the former not the latter.

By the time the sales figures have come out, I'm already bored of this boring, repetitive and empty game.

The worst Pokemon game I've played, I wish i'd have waited until it was reduced. At least all the other Pokemon game had variations in their locations and a desire to keep progressing.

Unfortunate to hear, but not surprising. As @StrangeDays has pointed out the game is fairly empty and the building graphics are atrocious for a $60/$70 title. The gameplay itself is fun, but definitely not $60 fun.

@Dee123 is it? I thought it would have been USA.

Anyone who thinks Nintendo or The Pokemon Company is going to hit the panic button over this is deluding themselves. The UK/EU market together constitute the relative weakest market for Nintendo and has done so since the Sega Mega Drive era. Polls consistently show that the average console gamer experience, by and large, is a PlayStation with the latest FIFA soldered onto the disc drive.

If this game suddenly stopped doing well in Japan or NA (which doesn't seem to be the case), then they'd start looking over their shoulders.