If you only take critical reception and fan response into account, Resident Evil 7 was a smashing success. Unfortunately, the metric that really matters to Capcom, sales, hasn’t been quite as impressive. As of the end of Capcom’s 2018 fiscal year (which came to a close on March 31) Resident Evil 7 had sold 3.5 million copies. Not bad for a hardcore survival horror game, but below Capcom’s expectations as the publisher had predicted they’d sell 4 million units by the end of March.
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Well, despite this shortfall, Capcom still has high hopes for Resident Evil 7. Very high hopes. The publisher recently updated their sales expectations, and Resident Evil 7 has a big challenge ahead…
“The lifecycle for games is growing longer, driven by ongoing digital sales; as a result, Resident Evil 4, 5 and 6 have each sold more than 7.5 to 10 million units cumulatively (including catalog and re-release sales). As such, we will work to achieve 10 million cumulative lifetime unit sales for Resident Evil 7 as well.
As of the end of the fiscal year, Resident Evil 7 shipped 3.5 million units, and Monster Hunter XX shipped 1.7 million units. It is a solid start, considering the short span between launch and fiscal year end. Further, unit sales for both titles continue to grow even now.”
10 million units huh? Yeesh. Granted, Resident Evil 7 doesn’t really rely on the latest tech, so I could see people continuing to buy it years down the road, but I think Capcom may have to give up on the idea that the game’s going to be a blockbuster. Resident Evil 7 returned respectability to the series, so the next, perhaps slightly more mainstream, game in the series can cash in, but RE7 is unlikely to sell 10 million itself.
You can check out WWG’s latest Resident Evil coverage here, and our terrifying back catalog of stories, right here.
[via Dark Side of Gaming]
