Pokemon Sword and Shield Are Officially Wildly Successful

As it turns out, the latest and greatest Pokemon video games, Pokemon Sword and Shield, have been wildly successful for Nintendo. According to a new set of financial results from the video game company, released today, Pokemon Sword and Shield sold over 16 million units last year. That number only gets more impressive when you take into account the fact that the video games only released on November 15th.

More specifically, Pokemon Sword and Shield sold 16.06 million units through December 31st of last year, according to the new report out from Nintendo. That’s enough to drop it at #5 for top-selling Nintendo Switch titles. And, again, that’s over the course of just six weeks total! To give this some perspective, the Nintendo 3DS’ Pokemon Sun and Moon titles have officially sold 16.18 million units since releasing in late 2016.

Given that the official Expansion Pass is on the horizon, and Pokemon Home is set to release next month, it’s hard to imagine the next set of financial results from Nintendo won’t also be particularly positive for the video games. And that’s just with known content releasing; imagine what might be coming down the pipeline that we’re not even aware of at the moment.

The Pokemon Sword Expansion Pass and Pokemon Shield Expansion Pass are available right now via Nintendo’s eShop for $29.99 each. Players that purchase either receive a special bonus: a code for a Pikachu Uniform and an Eevee Uniform. Even without the new Expansion Pass, a free update to the video games will allow trading of the various catchable Pokemon being added across those that do and do not have it.

What do you think of Pokemon Sword and Shield? Are you more excited for The Isle of Armor or The Crown Tundra DLC? Let us know in the comments, or hit me up directly on Twitter at @rollinbishop to talk all things gaming!

Pokemon Sword and Shield are currently available for the Nintendo Switch. The Expansion Pass, which must be purchased separately for each video game, is now available to pre-order from Nintendo’s eShop for $29.99. You can check out all of our previous coverage of Pokemon right here.