Arceus – how successful is the controversial game?

Pokémon Legends: Arceus has been a hot topic on social media since its reveal. On the one hand there is the new concept, on the other hand the outdated graphics. Apparently, that didn’t detract from the success of the game, because the first sales figures are now available.

Pokémon Legends: Arceus: Nintendo can rejoice

Pokémon Legends: Arceus has been available since January 28, 2022 and has spread to the 6.5 million times sold worldwide, as Nintendo of America happily announced today on Twitter:

The game sold whole games in its native Japan alone 1.43 million times and even slightly surpassed Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Pokémon Shining Pearl. The two remakes have been available since November 2021 and “only” sold 1.4 million copies in their first week. Only Animal Crossing was even more successful in Japan, as industry analyst David Gibson revealed on Twitter:

And what do the reviews say?

In addition to the sales figures, Pokémon Legends: Arceus was also able to convince the international press. The game is currently on the review aggregator Metacritic an impressive score of 84%. On other sites like OpenCritic, the game scores even a tad better with 85%.

And the fans also seem to love the latest offshoot, the user score on Metacritic attests the game a score of 81%, although it should be noted here that many hardcore fans and haters burden each other with review bombing. Be that as it may, the game also has a solid rating of 4.3 out of 5 stars on Amazon.

In short: Pokémon Legends: Arceus, despite all the criticism, is a complete success and should sell many millions more copies in the coming weeks and months. Maybe the offshoot even overcomes Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield? The two Switch games have teamed up almost 24 million times sold since its release in 2019. While there’s still a long way to go, the journey of Pokémon Legends: Arceus has only just begun.