The Pokémon Company has announced a special landmark for the Pokémon franchise. As of February 29, 2016, they have reached 279 million in total game sales.
This number includes the main Pokémon role-playing games, as well as the numerous Pokémon spinoffs. The main Pokémon games on their own have themselves sold over 210 million units. This merely a few days off of February 27, 1996, the 20 year anniversary of the first release of the very first Pokémon games ever; namely Pokémon Red and Pokémon Green in Japan.
The core of the Pokémon games remains the same as it has ever been; collect monsters that you can level up in battles, and trade them with friends. The Pokémon franchise today encompasses not only the games and its spinoffs, but anime, a trading card game, movies, comics, and many many toys. It rivals Mario itself as Nintendo’s most valuable and profitable IP.
As the year of the 20th anniversary, The Pokémon Company has big plans to celebrate. They outlined some of these plans so that they can celebrate with fans, but they doubtless have even more announcements and events planned.
In terms of games, Nintendo just revealed the latest installment in the main series, Pokémon Sun and Moon. Pokémon Sun and Moon will be releasing for 3DS later in 2016. On top of this are two huge Pokémon spinoffs; Pokémon GO and Pokkén Tournament. Pokémon GO has already started field tests in Japan and is slated for a worldwide release on mobile later this year. Pokkén Tournament will be releasing worldwide for Wii U in March 18, 2016. Bandai Namco and The Pokémon Company have already created a Pokkén Tournament Championship Series.
What are your favorite Pokémon memories? Feel free to share them with us in the comments.
