Pokemon Sun & Moon Breaks Sales Record for Franchise
By Kyle Sledge 15 December 2016
Nintendo’s Pokemon Sun & Moon break records for the franchise, with November sales for the game marking the biggest debut in the history of the series.
About half a month ago, Nintendo announced that its 2DS and 3DS titles Pokemon Sun and Moon had set North American sales records for the franchise by selling 3.7 million copies within the games’ first two weeks of availability. Now, it seems as if financial success was destined from the start for the latest entries in the RPG series, with November sales figures for Pokemon Sun and Moon marking the biggest debut in the history of the franchise.
As initially reported by VentureBeat, the news of Pokemon Sun and Moon‘s triumphant launch comes courtesy of the industry-tracking firm the NPD Group’s sales analysis for the month of November 2016. According to the examination of the numbers, Nintendo’s RPG titles managed to sell “8 percent more units than the previous best-selling combo of Pokemon: White and Pokemon: Black despite having 19 fewer days in market during the month.”
Interestingly enough, the figures that determined Pokemon Sun and Moon‘s record-breaking feat didn’t even take into account all of the possible units of which could be accounted. As the NPD Group notes, digital sales weren’t acknowledged when considering the full amount of copies solid, with the firm only tallying physical sales.
This really should come as no surprise to Pokemon Sun and Moon fans, especially when one recognizes the reports of the games selling like hotcakes around the globe prior to the NPD Group’s official analysis. For instance, the titles set records in the UK to become the fastest-selling Nintendo releases in the history of the region, dethroning the former champion, Wii Fit. Not to mention, the video game retailer GameStop revealed strong sales at the outset of Pokemon Sun and Moon‘s availability when the company posted its quarterly financial earnings report several weeks ago.
Not only did Pokemon Sun and Moon‘s strong sales performance assist the franchise in additional notoriety, but also the games boosted sales figures for Nintendo’s handhelds as well. As it happens, during the period of October 31 to November 26, the Nintendo 3DS had the “highest monthly physical software spending in the history of the platform,” which was “1 percent higher than the previous high in December 2014.”
While some might attribute Pokemon Sun and Moon‘s impressive debut to the Pokemon GO effect, with there being speculation that the mobile game’s success this summer translated into fans purchasing the 2DS and 3DS titles, others might believe the excellence of the products themselves being the biggest factor. After all, as evidenced in our review of Sun and Moon, the games gambled by offering a huge departure from the series’ built-in formula, but obviously, the changes paid off not only in terms of quality, but also in dividends.
Pokemon Sun and Moon are available now for Nintendo 2DS and 3DS.
