Metroid Dread looks likely to be the highest-selling Metroid game ever, dethroning 2002 GameCube title Metroid Prime.
Nintendorevealed on Tuesday that theNintendo Switchgame, which was released in 2021 to high critical praise, managed to sell2.9m copiesas of March 2022, which likely crowns it as the highest seller in the decades-long series.
Although public sales data for the entire Metroid series is hard to come by – it is, after all, 35-years-old – no Metroid title has ever been reported to sell more than 3 million units.Retro Studiosclaimed in 2007that Prime 1 had sold over 2 million units.
Despite achieving the sales milestone, 2.9m is still a conservative sales figure compared to other recent Switch first-party titles such as Kirby: The Forgotten Land (2.1m),Mario Party Superstars(6.88m), andThe Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD(3.91m).
And the game was reportedly off to a good start in several markets, following its October release.
According to GfK data, Dread enjoyed the series’biggest ever launch in the UK. While boxed copies were slightly short of the biggest launch in franchise history (by less than 1,000 copies), digital sales, which are not accounted for, will likely have pushed this number far beyond the previous record.
Dread sold three and a half times more copies at launch than the last 2D Metroid Game: Metroid: Samus Returns, which launched on 3DS in 2017.
In Japan, Dread enjoyed a strong first week in andoutsold nearly every other instalment in the regionin its opening few days.
In VGC’s Metroid DreadMetroid Dread review, we wrote: “With a near-perfect balance of nods to the past and fresh ideas, Metroid Dread brings cinematic flair, fast-paced action and a surprising story to the side-scrolling classic. This is the comeback fans have been waiting for.”
