Sales numbers are a very big thing in the world of video games, they help determine whether someone has done well with a game or console, or if they didn’t, or they didn’t live up to expectations, or if a trend is emerging, etc. The NPD numbers only cover the United States, but they’re a clear window into how some of the games and systems are doing worldwide. It may be almost the end of February, but January’s NPD numbers are here, and Kingdom Hearts III stood on top in regards to software.
Though the NPD numbers claim it, it’s honestly not that much of a surprise. While it’s true that Kingdom Hearts III was one of the big releases of the month, the game was already hyped beyond imagination thanks to its very lengthy development schedule. The title was almost assured success if for no other reason than fans wanted desperately to play the title, and 5 million in sales will get you the top spot.
Coming in second was the Resident Evil 2 Remake, which also isn’t too much of a surprise for the simple reason that the game was shown to be very good at launch, and then when reviews came out to praise the remastered title, it seemed to wash away all the uncertainty lying around it. And it too has had million in sales.
Third was Super Mario Bros U Deluxe, a surprise hit for the Nintendo Switch because of the fact that it was yet another Wii U ported game, but these ports continue to do well.
Finally, in hardware, the Nintendo Switch won the month, which is honestly a surprise given that both PS4 and Xbox had these two big releases in Kingdom Hearts and Resident Evil. The Switch also had a higher year-on-year sales than the other consoles, who didn’t rise in their sales in the same measurement.
