Japanese Charts: Baseball Takes The Crown In Another Switch-Filled Bonanza

Man, I wish we could get an update on global sales for the Switch. If it’s selling 200-300k monthly in Japan alone, it has to be approaching 150 million! It stands a good chance of overtaking the DS (I doubt it’ll pass PS2).

The Animal Crossing sales probably correlate to new Switch owners, right? Or I suppose current Switch owners that decided they wanted to play online with friends and family.

WTF The Legend of Heroes: Trails through Daybreak II is out already? That's way sooner than ever and I recently just bought the first Legend of Heroes: Trails through Daybreak last month.

@BanjoPickles IMO it will pass the PS2. Notably the 3DS still managed a further 10million after the Switch came out.

If the Switch manages the same after the next system it's a lock lol.

@BanjoPickles

It's important to note these are self reported numbers and given they are not a direct statement of revenue which would be bound by discloser law, there is no way to know how accurate they are.

Sony's lifetime PS2 number was already higher then what most people in the industry estimated based on sell-though numbers before the final update in 2012. But earlier this year they updated it seemingly at random, to give it a more comfortable lead on the Switch.

Not to say it's impossible that the Sony number isn't 100% accurate and the update, 12 years later, was based on some legitimate factor, like units sold between the last update and end of production, even though waiting over a decade to update a number you were repeating to investors every week and likely had a direct impact on your Stock price at the time is ... odd. But we just don't know. We also don't know how accurate Nintendo's figure is. Is one sell-though while the other is B2B? Dose one double count refurbished units sold OEM? Dose one count courtesy and promotional units given away for free as "sales"?

We just don't know, and (for me at least) that makes it a lot less interesting to talk about the "best selling of all time" now that they are this close. Even if you take the numbers on face, by Sony's "updated" number, the PS2 sold over 10 million units after the release of the PS3. So if we count on around 10 million Switch sales between 2025 and 2032 the Switch should not only take the crown, but take it in a boring, excruciatingly slow crawl. And that's not even accounting for when, in 2044, Nintendo updates the number to say they "found" a bunch more sales.

@BanjoPickles I think it's inevitable that it will overtake PS2 at this point. It has at least 2 more holiday periods in it.

Still good PS5 sales in Japan. 😊

I wish Powerful Pro Baseball would come to North America.

I’ve always wanted to play Powerful Pro Baseball, but never did due to the games being in Japanese. However, after aeeing Dracula and Goemon in this year’s trailer, I think I might break out the translator app on my phone and give this series a try.

@DogDetective

You can probably enjoys these games with a basic translation chart that tells you want the menus mean and very little else.

While I can't say with complete confidence, it looks like they replaced all Chinese numerals with Arabic numerals, so that should make it a lot easier. You obviously wont gets the full experience, there are cut scenes, bios, and a ton of humor that you would also need to translate, but this is a great type of game to help you learn.

You can get a chart for the menus, have a really fun baseball game to play, start translating the bios and cut scenes around your team, once your comfortable with that move on to other teams and the general cut scenes ... and so on.

@Dr_Lugae Yeah, but that's not really the same, as the 3DS and the Switch are very different consoles. If the "Switch 2" really is backwards compatible, it may halt sales of the original (unless they have a huge price cut).

@jorel262
There was ever USA version of Pro Baseball games long time ago on PS2 , Wii and NDS with name MLB Power Pros and MLB Power Pros 2008.

Another great week for the Switch.

@BanjoPickles It's gonna pass the PS2. Unless Sony keeps inflating the numbers.

They should do a barebones western release of powerful pro baseball. No MLB stats or crap, just the goofy Japanese game with translated text. And then be happy with whatever it sells! I had to walk uphill both ways!

@jorel262 And Europe!

Pretty bad for Sony when the only game making the top 10 is for the last gen console. Especially since it's been almost 4 years since the PS5 came out.

There's a localized stripped-down version of Power Pros available in the eShop:
https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2023/02/konamis-new-power-pros-baseball-game-is-available-on-switch-for-just-99-cents