It's quite funny a to see a 10 million seller game as "middleweight" for Switch lol

Hi there. I'm firmly in the hardcore Pokemon fan camp, and could easily challenge for that title on this site. You make good points, but I'm going to address one of them from a different perspective.

If you are a hardcore Pokemon fan are you really not going to buy the first core Pokemon game for a console? Unlikely.

Not as crazy as it may seem. I have refused to by the Gen 8 games mostly because of Dexit, and not only because of the aforementioned reasons of Sw/Sh feeling extremely stale and lacking in content and effort, but also because time and time again, Pokemon had been like the Street Fighter of RPGs. You could by the vanilla edition early, but you should know damn well by now that a newer, better version would be announced in a year's time, either the equivalent of a GOTY edition or a sequel that is still closely the same game and content. Sw/Sh are the first versions to embrace actual DLC to add to the existing vanilla game instead of releasing a new SKU of the game with new content the equivalent of DLC.

The other thing that makes Pokemon similar to Street Fighter is that the competitive community has to essentially follow whatever the official game(s) are at the time, because that's what the sponsored tournaments adapt to. There are plenty of players still on Gen 7, but VGC has moved on to Gen 8, so if you want to follow or partake in official rankings, ladders and tournaments, then that's the game you have to play. There were a lot of hardcore Street Fighter players that didn't like SFV (especially at launch), but adapted anyway because that's where EVO and other major sponsored tournaments shifted after SFV launched, because that's where Capcom wants the player base to be. So EVO and the like are going to follow suit, because it wants that sponsorship and support.

I realize that my second point kind of makes yours (hardcore fans buying the first core games despite disliking them), but it explains why they do beyond the idea that fans just moan and complain while mindlessly eating up new games.

I think AC/MK8D should be in their own tier. Those will leg up to 55-60M at this pace.

ACNH will do 5-7M in the holiday quarter this year and be sitting at 31-33M.

8.0M 2021
5.5M 2022
3.5M 2023
2.0M 2024
2.5M LTD

That's ~54.5M with an aggressive 76% drop in 2021 off of only a 9 month first year. What if Lite gets a bundle this year or next year @$200 or even cheaper (150? 170?). Could stay over 10M next year and then it legs past 60M.

MK8D same story. Expecting 4-5M in this year's holiday quarter has it sitting at 33-34M by end of 2020 (that's 10.5-11M, peak year in year 4 lol, and this current quarter was just the largest non-holiday/launch quarter it ever had - last quarter was second largest).

2021 - 9.0M
2022 - 6.5M
2023 - 5.0M
2024 - 3.0M
LTD - 4.0M

That's 60M. I guess if they launch MK9 sometime in 2022-2024 it might dent these numbers, but we're still looking at 50-55M.

BOTW and SSBU expecting mid-to-high 30M range. BOTW has now slightly beat out SSBU for the past 2 quarters, which I did not expect, especially given SSBU's strong extended DLC support. I imagine this trend continues and it pulls back ahead in a year or so. Expecting 35-40M range for BOTW and ~35M for Smash. These are the top heavyweights, with SMO/Pokemon rounding out this category.

Maybe Mario 3D World and BOTW2 join this category (at this point, I'm doubtful that BOTW2 doesn't cross 20M - it will have a mega opening that'll make it hard to miss the 20M mark I think. Anything beyond that depends on WOM and further NSW hardware legs.

I agree that MK8DX will cross 50 mil and AC has a very good shot at it as well, but I don't really see a reason to give them their own tier though. Its interesting to compare them to the others.

I'm very doubtful that 3D World will join the heavyweight category, but a new 3D Mario almost certainly would and that's likely to happen. Pokémon Gen 9 is also a shoo-in.

Unless the disparity squashes the chart too much and makes it hard to read, I agree that it's better to keep them all on one chart. But if it gets too unreadable for the "smaller" games (as in, under 20M sales. And geez, calling something selling 12-20M a smaller title...), better put the top 2 in a separate chart. Best would be of course if there's another title(s) to join them at the top, but Nintendo already catched a lightning a bottle twice in a row on the Switch, managing to do that a third time would be absolutely crazy.

But here's the thing: There are probably more titles coming out that will sell 12M+. BotW2 is already a serious contender, and any upcoming Pokemon game that isn't Snap should also get into there. So if that chart gets too crowded, then maybe it will be necessary to split it into one 15-25M and one 25M+ chart.

Yea it's true that the charts could eventually get too crowded, and if that happens I will split it up further. Currently the middleweights chart is the one I'm most worried about though, but I suppose if I make 3 tiers it would probably make sense to move Super Mario Party up to the second one and maybe Ring Fit if it keeps up its momentum.

I don't understand the attraction to animal crossing. Is there some hidden shit that gives you a high in the game or something lol?

another chart of the lower weights would be nice, like xenoblade, kirby, and fire emblem.

Well, I don't see any appeal in Call of Duty or Fifa, for instance, but they sell millions of copies each and every year.

Tastes differ, don't think about it too much.

It's just a matter of taste I guess. 

For instance I find sport games pretty boring, and don't like FPS either, but many people love them, likely the most popular genres in Europe 

I always liked life simulator games, so one about befriending cute animals and decorating my home and island is perfect, it's relaxing and was very nice for socializing during the lockdown too