A week after its release, Dragon Ball Sparking Zero has achieved some record-breaking sales.
As shared on Twitter by Genki Jpn, Bandai Namco revealed in a press release that Dragon Ball Sparking Zero sold three million units worldwide in the first 24 hours after it released last October 7, 2024.
This makes it the fastest selling Dragon Ball game ever made in the history of the franchise. It also puts it in the upper echelons of the fighting game genre in particular.
So let’s interrogate the borders of this achievement. Street Fighter 6 released in June 2023, and sold 1 million units five days after launch. As of September 2024, it has sold over 4 million units.
Tekken 8 reportedly doubled Street Fighter 6’s launch numbers in the UK when it launched this January. As of February 26, it has sold two million copies in its first month. Mortal Kombat 1 was not that successful for NetherRealm, but the game just before it, Mortal Kombat 11, was a franchise highlight. Selling 15 million copies three years after launch made it the best-selling game in the franchise. In both these cases, Bandai Namco and WB Games chose not to share the actual launch sales with the public.
So, is Dragon Ball Sparking Zero as big as Super Smash Bros? It may be close. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate released exclusively on the Nintendo Switch in December 7, 2018. It went on to sell 5 million copies in the first three days. As of March 2024, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate has sold 34 million copies.
And it looks like Dragon Ball Sparking Zero has a lot of potential to aspire to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate’s sales records. What these two games have in common aside from their record breaking sales is that neither are in the commonly known mold of 2D fighting games.
But while Super Smash Bros. is commonly seen as the progenitor of the platform fighter, Dragon Ball Sparking is known for popularizing the 3D arena fighter. In fact, one could credibly say that this series set the template for most other anime licensed fighting games that came after it, including the long running Naruto series, and more recent outings like Kill la Kill -IF.
So one could see Dragon Ball Sparking Zero as similar to Street Fighter IV’s release in 2008. While the 2D fighter has built a dedicated community broader and bigger than it has ever been, it’s clear that there was even more potential in the genre for fighting games that appealed to more casual gamers.
And Dragon Ball Sparking Zero’s success may very well launch a new trend of 3D arena fighting games. If that raises fighting games up to the echelons of the industry, to actually compete with genres like battle royale and online shooters, we may see a real industry shift unseen since the 1990s.
In the meantime, congratulations are due to publisher Bandai Namco and developer Spike Chunsoft.
