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Discussion Is it really "fair" or "correct" to say that Pokémon BW underperformed or was a failure?

ILovethegameAC

ILovethegameAC

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I often hear that Pokémon BW underperformed or that was a failure, since it has the lowest sales out of all the mainline games if you don't count third versions, remakes or Legends Arceus, and that it sold less than DP despite being released when the DS had a bigger user base, with a 12% or so decline in sales. However, the more I think about it, the more I kind of don't see this point at all if you see all the context:

-BW was released in Japan when the DS succesor was about to release, and when it already released in the west, so despite the DS having a big userbase, not all of those users were gonna be interested on a DS game by that point. Plus in many cases sequels released way too late on a console lifetime tend to sell less than their predecessors.

-DS and Wii games after 2010 were generally in a big decline in sales, with sequels like Skyward Sword, Spirit Tracks, WarioWare DIY, Mario and Sonic 2012, Mario Party 9, Wii Play Motion or Mario vs. DK Miniland Mayehm selling half of what their previous entries did or even less, so the fact that Pokémon only had a drop of 12% or so is impressive really. If Pokémon was a failure, then the others were massive disasters in sales.

-It is true that Pokémon Sun and Moon did sell a bit more than BW despite being released on a similar time frame for their respective systems, and on a less succesful console, but it had the benefit of being released after the Pokémon Go fever, so it easily had a bump that BW did not have, plus the smaller console userbase clearly wasn't an issue at all since XY already sold almost the same as DP. Also, while the Switch was already announced when SM came out, it was only for like a month and with not much info at all given to the public, so it likely had no effect on it's sales.

So overall I don't see this point, it is the least selling main gen game, but if you see the full context it seems like a totally fair succes to me.
 
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Pokemon was on a decline since gen 2 (gen 4 barely being above gen 3 despite double the sales of the DS doesn't change that), gen 5 simply fell in line with that and was released late into the DS's life too
 
Not really. Maybe it wasn't as big of a hit as it could have been, but Pokémon at its worst is still very successful. However, I do think it's fair to say the franchise as a whole was financially stagnant at that time.
 
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Can the series go back to selling like that so I can get another game in the series as good as Gen V? Nothing's even come close to BW1/2 for me.

Also no it still sold better than like 90% of all other games out there and probably didn't cost anywhere near as much.
 
DS software sales are weird to analyze because the userbase that was buying software was much smaller than the total sales due to

1. The same people buying several DS units

2. Extreme piracy

3. The DS userbase migrating to the iPhone later on in its life.
 
I wish I could fail and make millions of dollars.

Obvious dip from Gen IV, but I don’t think any Pokémon Gen has outsold the previous one if it’s on the same hardware. GSC didn’t outsell RBY, SM didn’t outsell XY, and SV might not cross SwSh.

Though maybe people in 2011 realized that Gen V is one of the weakest generations AMIRITE
 
I have not played it yet. I heard interesting things. Hopefully TPC can give it the love, care, and polish Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl got. The best remake in the last decade of gaming.
 
they should've been 3DS games for one, would've helped year 1 and Y2 of the system significantly.
 
Yamanoi said:
I have not played it yet. I heard interesting things. Hopefully TPC can give it the love, care, and polish Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl got. The best remake in the last decade of gaming.
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Genuinely curious, quick question. What remakes in the past decade have you played? I don't even mean to sound rude, I cannot think of a remake that got as much of a lukewarm at best reaction as BDSP. I didn't even pick it up because the majority reaction felt like it was "or you could just play Platinum"
 
JazzyFuture said:
Genuinely curious, quick question. What remakes in the past decade have you played? I don't even mean to sound rude, I cannot think of a remake that got as much of a lukewarm at best reaction as BDSP. I didn't even pick it up because the majority reaction felt like it was "or you could just play Platinum"
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That sounded like sarcasm to me
 
It was still the 6th best selling game in the history of the DS selling over 15 million copies combined, and it outsold boomer fan favorite Heart Gold and Soul Silver (over 12 million). Anyone who tried to argue B&W was some kind of sales disappointment isn't living in reality.
 
ILovethegameAC said:
I often hear that Pokémon BW underperformed or that was a failure, since it has the lowest sales out of all the mainline games if you don't count third versions, remakes or Legends Arceus, and that it sold less than DP despite being released when the DS had a bigger user base, with a 12% or so decline in sales.
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the day people stop using the install base of a console as a comparison for sales data will be the day where sales discussion will be tolerable.
After a certain threshold the install base becomes a non factor, expecting a game to sell more because one is on a console that sold 120 mil and the other on a console that sold 80 milion stops making sense when you start to think about it for more than 2 seconds.
In the case of bw it was the 4th mainline pokemon release of 5 in the same console, a console with rampant piracy problems, and it still sold 15+ mil copies.
 
the general pokemon-playing-public don't like good pokemon games, hence why B/W sold lower than other entries. /s...kinda

as others have said, no i don't think it's correct. in fact, didn't B/W have the fastest and biggest opening in japan of all time at that point? that's quite impressive.
 
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Kartina said:
the day people stop using the install base of a console as a comparison for sales data will be the day where sales discussion will be tolerable.
After a certain threshold the install base becomes a non factor, expecting a game to sell more because one is on a console that sold 120 mil and the other on a console that sold 80 milion stops making sense when you start to think about it for more than 2 seconds.
In the case of bw it was the 4th mainline pokemon release of 5 in the same console, a console with rampant piracy problems, and it still sold 15+ mil copies.
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How many more copies do you think Minecraft could sell if smart phones, computers, tablets, and game consoles had a larger install base? 🗿
 
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Piracy.
DS sales , while not flatlining, did get hit hard by how easy it was to order 1 r4 cart and play all games.
Additionally the D's was still mich a "kids" console, many parents had the mentality "you already have a Pokémon game".
It also had the "backlash" of not including the old Mons, ...

Yeah, 15m is great in that context.
 
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Trying to remember that time, I feel like B/W just…came out one day. Like I don’t remember a lick of marketing for it. And I worked at a GameStop at the time.

15 million is definitely not as much as TPC or Nintendo probably wanted, but such was the case for a bunch of generations, basically until Pokémon Go. X and Y were even worse for a while. The brand underperformed for years, so I think it’s less an issue with the games and more with the brand.
 
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I played it on an R4 cos I was broke at the time if that answers your question.
 
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15.64 (BW1) +7.81 (BW2) million units sold according to wikipedia and slightly more according to vgchartz.
that's 23.45 million. nearly as much as sword/shield and scarlet/violet. which both had extensive DLCs unlike BW.

Since people often combine the sales of a certain generation (unless it's a totally different game like RSE vs FRLG or ORAS vs XY), I think it's fair to combine BW1 and BW2 under the same group. Because like I said, they're basically the same game save for a couple minor differences.

Turns out doing that, you realize gen V sold more than most GB/GBA/DS and even switch titles.
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Even within the DS generation it wasn't a failure. Quite the contrary - the sequel sold more than platinum, the prequel sold nearly as much as the best selling pokemon ds game.
 
kasparov77 said:
Since people often combine the sales of a certain generation (unless it's a totally different game like RSE vs FRLG or ORAS vs XY), I think it's fair to combine BW1 and BW2 under the same group. Because like I said, they're basically the same game save for a couple minor differences.
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A little questionable, but probably right; in reality there's no apples to apples comparison and that's fine. But you can't say that and this imo:
kasparov77 said:
15.64 (BW1) +7.81 (BW2) million units sold according to wikipedia and slightly more according to vgchartz.
that's 23.45 million. nearly as much as sword/shield and scarlet/violet. which both had extensive DLCs unlike BW.
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B2W2 added substantial postgame content and was sold as a standalone game. It feels disingenuous to lump its sales in with BW and then act like the two combined were at a disadvantage because they didn't have DLC; in reality, I'd imagine that strategy pushed more individual unit sales than a hypothetical DLC would've. If you weren't combining them, I'd agree with the notion.

But yes, the games did great.
 
Jersh said:
B2W2 added substantial postgame content and was sold as a standalone game. It feels disingenuous to lump its sales in with BW
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People do the same in regards to platinum which added the battle frontier and distortion world so it's only fair.
Regardless of the changes, the amount of re-used assets, code and overall similarities across BW and BW2 essentially validates the claim that they're nearly the same/"basically the same" (although I disagree with saying they're in fact, the same game).

Jersh said:
act like the two combined were at a disadvantage because they didn't have DLC
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The fact sword/shield released in 2019 and managed to keep on selling well enough throughout 2020 to ~2021 unlike other older, DLC-less pokemon titles that had sales stagnate quicker kinda proves my point.

I also don't know why you're against grouping sales data when it's something not only done in the software space but also hardware.
DSi is essentially different from the DS phat and DS Lite yet it's grouped in the same sales data as the "nintendo ds".
Same goes for the 2DS and N3DS.

If the oreo company decides to make a new packaging for their cookies and make a couple changes to the formula would they split the sales data across the old and the new packaging? of course not. It makes no sense. They might HAVE the info on the old vs new version but they sure as hell won't start over the count.
Same way nintendo didn't start over the count when they released the 2019 switch nor the OLED.
 
And regardless, even IF we don't group sales for BW2 and BW1, the first iteration isn't even "one of the worst" selling games in the franchise. It's somewhere between the middle.
 
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kasparov77 said:
People do the same in regards to platinum which added the battle frontier and distortion world so it's only fair.
Regardless of the changes, the amount of re-used assets, code and overall similarities across BW and BW2 essentially validates the claim that they're nearly the same/"basically the same" (although I disagree with saying they're in fact, the same game).


The fact sword/shield released in 2019 and managed to keep on selling well enough throughout 2020 to ~2021 unlike other older, DLC-less pokemon titles that had sales stagnate quicker kinda proves my point.

I also don't know why you're against grouping sales data when it's something not only done in the software space but also hardware.
DSi is essentially different from the DS phat and DS Lite yet it's grouped in the same sales data as the "nintendo ds".
Same goes for the 2DS and N3DS.

If the oreo company decides to make a new packaging for their cookies and make a couple changes to the formula would they split the sales data across the old and the new packaging? of course not. It makes no sense. They might HAVE the info on the old vs new version but they sure as hell won't start over the count.
Same way nintendo didn't start over the count when they released the 2019 switch nor the OLED.
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I think you've misunderstood my point.

Grouping sales is fine, as I said in the first half of my reply. It's using B2W2 sales numbers to bolster BW's numbers while simultaneously acting like that's somehow not parallel to the extended support the Switch gens have gotten via DLC that's disingenuous. BW's sales stagnated, yes, and then extra content via B2W2 gave it a second wind. It's the same thing, there's no need to point out the lack of DLC.
 
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