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A thread on 5ch’s Hardware/Industry (“Geha”) board reports that Nintendo’s new “Fire Emblem: Bansei Senkou” (lit. “Myriad Purples, Thousand Reds”) for Switch 2 is already turning up as “sold out” or switched over to “October shipment” pre-orders on retail sites like eDion, only a short time after launch. Some posters voiced suspicion that this looks like a manufactured shortage — “it doesn’t feel like it’s selling that well” — while others insisted it’s simply that retailers ordered light stock. The thread turned into a running guessing game about actual sales, using the first-week numbers of previous entries “Three Houses” and “Engage” (both said to be around 150,000 units) as a benchmark.
It doesn’t seem to be selling all that much, but
some stores are already showing “sold out” or have switched to October-shipment pre-orders
Nintendo Fire Emblem: Bansei Senkou [Switch 2] BEEPAACSA
Source: edion.com / original listing here
What people said
A dud that doesn't hold a candle to Engage or Three Houses.
If Bansei Senkou counts as 'pretentious,' Three Houses was too.
The special display was completely cleaned out, so I think physical copies are selling decently too.
There were like 10 Elden Ring dummy boxes,
but the second I bought one, the clerk suddenly pulled every remaining dummy off the shelf lol
Guess there was only 1 left in stock.
Not sure if retailers just aren't stocking enough to begin with, though.
Feels like Bansei Senkou's buzz has grown more after release than it had beforehand. My guess is retailers that stocked it based on how past entries sold on PlayStation didn't order enough for Switch, and now it's outselling expectations and running short.
Yeah, exactly.
I go to the game section at an electronics store and see sold-out signs everywhere and think 'wow, business must be booming' — but then I check Famitsu's weekly chart and the numbers are often way lower than I'd expect.
Fair point.
Still, even so it'll probably move around 40,000 units.
There's nothing else out there to play right now.
…wait, it's a first-party AAA exclusive… s-surely it'll sell at least 40,000… right?
I don't think it's a manufactured shortage so much as retailers just ordering a smaller quantity.
Well, obviously.
It's also possible they did order a decent amount and it still sold out because demand was just that high.
Three Houses and Engage both did about 150,000 units domestically in their first week, so if demand for this one clearly beats that, selling out without a tight supply is plausible.
Personally I'm guessing around 100,000, though.
Three Houses stayed at #1 for the entire first week.
It even sold out repeatedly, and whenever it dipped it bounced right back to #1.
US Amazon has it listed as out of stock, you know.
How do you mean?
02./01. [NSW] Fire Emblem: Three Houses # <SLG> (Nintendo) {2019.07.26} (¥6,980) – 35,804 / 178,934 <60-80%> (-75%)
https://www.resetera.com/threads/media-create-sales-week-31-2019-jul-29-aug-04.133503/
Factoring in the install base, breaking 100,000 would count as a success, I'd say.
Not happening, going by the US Amazon ranking trend.
Looking like a flop so far.
And with digital code cards already being dumped at fire-sale prices, the download ratio's probably a mess too.
Console transitions are always rough.
FE fans have bought a new console for this series every single time the hardware changed, though.
Fans alone won't make sales explode.
With Three Houses, people who don't normally buy games bought it too.
That's talking about it selling steadily later on, though.
Even Three Houses didn't explode in sales in its first week.
That was already 3 years into the console's life, when the install base was huge.
This one is only 2 years in, so it won't be that easy.
So then what does that make Wolverine… lol
Did you forget the spike in interest from the 'Bloody Reunion' trailer?
Within the FE series, Awakening and Three Houses are outliers — Engage's numbers represent the hardcore base. How far past that the series can pull in casual buyers is what really swings total sales.
This time, domestically, I'd guess it lands just a bit above Engage. Factoring in the digital download ratio, I don't think it goes much higher than that.
Compared to how things looked before Three Houses launched, this game's true protagonist has a weaker hook.
Actually, Engage outsold Three Houses in the first week.
Bansei Senkou came out only about 1 year and 3 months after the Switch 2 launched, so the gap in install base must be huge.
Well, both the Switch 2 and its games got pricier too.
The existence of the Switch Lite [as a cheap original-Switch option] is a big factor as well.
I'd think the people stocking shelves know that too.
Both Engage and Three Houses did around 150,000.
https://krsw.5ch.io/test/read.cgi/ghard/1790145789/
Must be nice having plenty of stock over there lol
Does physical-only sales data even mean much in this day and age [the Reiwa era, i.e. now]?
Stock's way oversupplied lol
Nojima and Joshin [Japanese electronics chains] don't have it, though.
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
Both “Three Houses” and “Engage” in the Fire Emblem series are said to have sold around 150,000 units in their first week, and this figure was repeatedly cited in the thread as a benchmark for estimating actual sales. That said, the numbers thrown around in the thread aren’t official weekly sales data from outlets like Famitsu, but rather posters’ own guesses or unofficial tallies sourced from overseas forums, so some caution is warranted. It’s also worth noting that “Three Houses” launched more than two years after the original Switch’s debut, once the console’s install base was already large, whereas this new title arrived only about a year into the Switch 2’s life, while its install base is still growing — meaning a straightforward comparison of unit sales isn’t quite apples-to-apples. Where opinions in the thread split was over whether the in-store shortage is “proof it’s selling well” or simply “the result of retailers ordering conservatively” — both explanations remain circumstantial, and an official weekly sales report will be needed to settle the matter.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Hardware/Industry, “Geha”) thread “Fire Emblem — a manufactured shortage?“.
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