With the updated financial data from Nintendo's latest report, we know that the Nintendo Switch has overtaken the Nintendo Wii in terms of sales. That's not the only upset, though, as the Pokemon franchise has seen a new contender for some of the highest sales figures the series has ever seen. As of December 31, 2021, Pokemon Sword and Shield have sold 23.9 million copies, putting it ahead of Pokemon Gold and Silver, and locking it in as the second-best selling Pokemon game, behind Red and Blue.

The current sales record for the Pokemon series can be seen below. Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, the latest entries in the series as of the time of the financial report, have clocked in at 13.9 million units sold, making it the 12th-best selling title, only a month after their release in November 2021.

Red / Green / Blue – 31,380,000
Sword / Shield – 23,900,000
Gold / Silver – 23,700,000
Diamond / Pearl – 17,670,000
X / Y – 16,580,000
Sun / Moon – 16,270,000
Ruby / Sapphire – 16,220,000
Black / White – 15,640,000
Yellow – 14,640,000
Omega Ruby / Alpha Sapphire – 14,460,000
Let’s Go, Pikachu / Eevee – 14,330,000
Brilliant Diamond / Shining Pearl – 13,970,000
HeartGold / SoulSilver – 12,720,000
FireRed / LeafGreen – 12,000,000
Ultra Sun / Ultra Moon – 8,890,000
Black 2 / White 2 – 8,250,000
Platinum – 7,693,000
Emerald – 7,060,000
Crystal – 6,300,000

Source

 

[Goku1992A]

That is decidedly undeserved. Sword/Shield are probably the worst entries in the series and if they're still selling like hotcakes despite that, all that's telling Game Freak is that they should continue making halfassed games with cut content released as DLC and not innovate or improve things. That is exactly the opposite of the direction I want Pokemon to head in.
I bought Sword, but I will not be buying future entries until things improve. I had high expectations from the Wild Areas thinking they were going to replace routes but as it turned out there was only a single Wild Area and about half as many routes as there usually would be, and they were short to boot. Sword/Shield looked so promising from early gameplay, which made the disappointment even bigger.

To anyone who pirated Legends and liked it, you should buy the game to show that this is what you want more of, and not more games like Sword/Shield. If Legends becomes the #1 best selling Pokemon game then maybe Game Freak will understand.

Agree and Disagree with you...

Sword and Shield should be the standing point for next gen Pokemon games in terms of Graphics. Now the "Wild Area" I hated that nor I seen the point of why are they putting a level 60 pokemon in the beginning of the game...

They need to clean up the game maybe make a SW/SH 2 but no wild aera that's just silly make a special area ... I enjoyed the game but I feel it was rushed with little to no post game adventures (DLC don't count)

But pokemon been around for nearly 25 years they need to focus on bettery storytelling opposing to making more pokemon because we have enough pokemon what we need is a better story and post game adventure. 50% of the game should be beating the elite 4 and the other 50% if post game adventure...

Only game that ever got that right was Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal and HG and SS

 

[Kanakops]

I bought them and liked them...

Same, a lot of people here are just complaining for reasons I don't share. Sword and Shield was a great Pokemon game, clearly even better than remakes like bdsp.

In addition, their way of complaining is quite condescending, those who enjoyed the game (us) have no taste and are responsible for "the downfall of the license" according to them. Of course they have good taste, culture and a high IQ, they can judge the quality of a game unlike us.

 

[SonicRings]

This is the most depressing news I've read all week.

 

[SonicRings]

First, there's the Switch boost effect, this console just makes games sell well.
But at least that is not manipulable data, what is manipulable is the DLC. It replaced the third version which is counted separately in this chart. Lots of people only buy the third version (Platinum, Emerald, Black and White 2, ...) because it's usually the definitive experience. Meanwhile, in the case of Sword and Shield, the third version is more or less the DLC. So anyone wanting to play generation 8 needs to buy Sword or Shield.

If we merge the numbers of the third version with the base games, the list will be (doing mental arithmetic, I hope I didn't make a mistake) :

Red / Green / Blue – 31,380,000
Gold / Silver / Crystal – 30,000,000
Diamond / Pearl / Platinum – 25,663,000
Sun / Moon + Ultra – 25,160,000
Sword / Shield – 23,900,000
Black / White + 2 – 23,890,000
Ruby / Sapphire / Emerald – 23,280,000
X / Y – 16,580,000
Yellow – 14,640,000
Omega Ruby / Alpha Sapphire – 14,460,000
Let’s Go, Pikachu / Eevee – 14,330,000
Brilliant Diamond / Shining Pearl – 13,970,000
HeartGold / SoulSilver – 12,720,000
FireRed / LeafGreen – 12,000,000

Still very solid numbers, but not as amazing as it sounds.

Anyway, there's no proper way to compare these numbers, since they're released on very different systems which sold very differently.

I guess a better way of comparing the sales would be in terms of percentage of people who own the system they're on. How many GB owners bought gen 1/2, for example? How many switch owners bought SwSh? Etc.

Cuz I agree, the DLC being included with SwSh is an easy way of boosting its sales.

 

[RichardTheKing]

Shows exactly whats wrong with Pokemon, they are too big to fail.
They could probably take a turd and label it with Pokemon and it would sell.

They already did - these games. And then did a repeat with BDSP, instead aiming it at fans hoping for a decent-quality remake.
Two major turds, right there. Want a third? Okay, Let's Go Pikachu and Eevee - drops a lot of content, and doesn't even include the VS Seeker or Sevii Islands, or Pro Controller support. Motion controls can go fuck themselves, especially mandatory ones.

 

[RichardTheKing]

To anyone who pirated Legends and liked it, you should buy the game to show that this is what you want more of, and not more games like Sword/Shield. If Legends becomes the #1 best selling Pokemon game then maybe Game Freak will understand.

I would, definitely, but...well, being banned from the eShop means I can't buy their games (idiots).

 

[SonicRings]

I would, definitely, but...well, being banned from the eShop means I can't buy their games (idiots).

I mean, I probably still wouldn't buy it because I DON'T want game freak to think that they did a good job with this lazy, rushed game that looks worse than a PS2 game. They want my money? Earn it. Just because this is better than SwSh doesn't mean this is what I want lol

But yeah, I don't get nintendo's stupid logic of banning people from purchasing games from them as being a form of punishment. oH nO, I cAn't GiVe YoU mY mOnEy AnYmOrE bEcAuSe YoU cAuGhT mE pIrAtInG... So now I can only pirate? Huh, that works out well for pirates.

 

[RichardTheKing]

I mean, I probably still wouldn't buy it because I DON'T want game freak to think that they did a good job with this lazy, rushed game that looks worse than a PS2 game. They want my money? Earn it. Just because this is better than SwSh doesn't mean this is what I want lol

But yeah, I don't get nintendo's stupid logic of banning people from purchasing games from them as being a form of punishment. oH nO, I cAn't GiVe YoU mY mOnEy AnYmOrE bEcAuSe YoU cAuGhT mE pIrAtInG... So now I can only pirate? Huh, that works out well for pirates.

Not even pirating - all I did was try out Daybreak to update my Switch. That's not technically-illegal, unlike pirating a game, which I had never done before the ban - but now I'm forced to do so.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Agree and Disagree with you...

Sword and Shield should be the standing point for next gen Pokemon games in terms of Graphics. Now the "Wild Area" I hated that nor I seen the point of why are they putting a level 60 pokemon in the beginning of the game...

They need to clean up the game maybe make a SW/SH 2 but no wild aera that's just silly make a special area ... I enjoyed the game but I feel it was rushed with little to no post game adventures (DLC don't count)

But pokemon been around for nearly 25 years they need to focus on bettery storytelling opposing to making more pokemon because we have enough pokemon what we need is a better story and post game adventure. 50% of the game should be beating the elite 4 and the other 50% if post game adventure...

Only game that ever got that right was Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal and HG and SS

Sword/Shield still look like upscaled 3DS games. They look fine, but for how they look, they run extremely poorly. They run as badly as Zelda BotW and that game looks about 10 times better and has a huge open world and high a render distance.
I'm not satisfied with that. I want Zelda BotW graphics.

 

[icogniito]

Sword/Shield still look like upscaled 3DS games. They look fine, but for how they look, they run extremely poorly. They run as badly as Zelda BotW and that game looks about 10 times better and has a huge open world and high a render distance.
I'm not satisfied with that. I want Zelda BotW graphics.

They run much worse than BOTW ever did. The thing is GF just dont care, they have a formula they use to push new games out every generation with the exact same template. PLA is a step in the right direction but I will be very suprised if game freak takes the improvements made there into the main series.

 

[SonicRings]

Not even pirating - all I did was try out Daybreak to update my Switch. That's not technically-illegal, unlike pirating a game, which I had never done before the ban - but now I'm forced to do so.

That's even more ironic. Nintendo sure are arrogant and smug to treat their users like criminals for the tiniest things. God forbid you make a fan-game!

 

[SonicRings]

Sword/Shield still look like upscaled 3DS games. They look fine, but for how they look, they run extremely poorly. They run as badly as Zelda BotW and that game looks about 10 times better and has a huge open world and high a render distance.
I'm not satisfied with that. I want Zelda BotW graphics.

They run as bad as BotW? That's the funniest thing I've heard all day. BotW runs great. I don't recall any frame drops at all. What did you play on, yuzu in 2017 on a low end laptop?

 

[The Real Jdbye]

I would, definitely, but...well, being banned from the eShop means I can't buy their games (idiots).

No it doesn't. I buy all my Switch games physically.

 

[icogniito]

They run as bad as BotW? That's the funniest thing I've heard all day. BotW runs great. I don't recall any frame drops at all. What did you play on, yuzu in 2017 on a low end laptop?

BOTW has frame drops (though not close to being as bad as SWSH), one obvious one is in the beginning of the game by the axe in the tree stump. The frame drops are actually worse on switch than they were on wii u.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

They run as bad as BotW? That's the funniest thing I've heard all day. BotW runs great. I don't recall any frame drops at all. What did you play on, yuzu in 2017 on a low end laptop?

I think you should play it again. BotW has a lot of framedrops down to around 20 FPS especially in areas with a lot of grass. This is a widely known fact. The Wii U and Switch versions both run about the same.

 

[SonicRings]

BOTW has frame drops (though not close to being as bad as SWSH), one obvious one is in the beginning of the game by the axe in the tree stump. The frame drops are actually worse on switch than they were on wii u.

Oh interesting. I've only played the Wii U version, then on cemu in 60fps.

 

[SavageNoble]

Interesting. To me Legends Arceus invalidates the existence of any games past the DS releases. After those the gameplay is just so criminally outdated that I'm not able to have fun anymore. LA should have been released ~10 years ago.

BTW I wouldn't be surprised if GF tries to make fans forget about the last few generations after the potential success of LA.

 

[64bitmodels]

the fact that any of the games in this shit series managed to become popular to begin with depresses me

 

[Sheimi]

Weird to see SwSh as 2nd best selling when it really sucks. I still have not finished Crown Tundra because the game is boring as heck.

 

[Lumstar]

It's not bait. It's the true. Fundamentally speaking, Gold and Silver were horribly coded messes, the pokeballs didn't even work right, the XP curve was horrible. Most people's love for it is more nostalgia than anything, and even now they all act like brats "But Gold and Silver gave us TWO regions!" every new game.

To its credit, Gold and Silver had more consistent sprites and superior battle mechanics.
Nevertheless you're not wrong. The map design suffered (Kanto was stripped of several memorable areas). A shift toward lower difficulty would become a topic of much derision in later games. There's also puzzling marketing (like how an original soundtrack was never released).

Not to mention the internet drama stemming from GSC's ideas! Such drama! Including every Pokemon set the series on a course that eventually erupted in the "dex cut" outcry.