Famitsu Third Party Top 50 2021(Unofficial Ranking)
- [NSW] Monster Hunter Rise (Capcom) - 2.350.693
- [NSW] Momotaro Dentetsu (Konami) - 1.266.477
- [NSW] Minecraft (Microsoft) - 708.670
- [NSW] Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town (Marvelous) – 309.722
- [NSW] Monster Hunter Stories 2 (Capcom) - 227.554
- [PS4] Tales of Arise (Bandai Namco) - 213.474
- [NSW] Baseball Spirits 2021 (Konami) - 210.259
- [PS4] Resident Evil Village (Capcom) - 191.983
- [NSW] Shin Megami Tensei V (Atlus) - 184.388
- [NSW] Crayon Shin-Chan (Neos) - 183.733
- [PS4] NieR Replicant (Square Enix) - 158.265
- [PS4] Lost Judgement (Sega) – 151.039
- [NSW] Dragon Quest XI S (Square Enix) - 137.836
- [PS4] Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba (Aniplex) - 136.617
- [NSW] Bravely Default II (Square Enix) – 136.091
- [NSW] Rune Factory 5 (Marvelous) - 127.968
- [NSW] Yu-Gi-Oh! Rush Duel (Konami) - 127.221
- [NSW] Human Fall Flat (Teyon Japan) - 126.373
- [NSW] Taiko no Tatsujin: Drum 'n' Fun! (Bandai Namco) - 116.296
- [NSW] Fitness Boxing 2 (Imagineer) - 115.375
- [NSW] Fishing Spirits (Bandai Namco) - 113.231
- [NSW] Minecraft Dungeons + Ultimate Edition (Microsoft) - 96.681
- [NSW] Super Robot Wars 30 (Bandai Namco) - 89.931
- [NSW] Tsukihime (Aniplex) - 89.916
- [PS4] Tsukihime (Aniplex) - 80.042
- [PS4] Super Robot Wars 30 (Bandai Namco) - 74.036
- [NSW] Little Nightmares II (Bandai Namco) - 72.796
- [PS5] Resident Evil Village (Capcom) - 72.761
- [PS4] Samurai Warriors 5 (Koei Tecmo) - 72.727
- [NSW] Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot (Bandai Namco) - 69.449
- [NSW] Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin (Marvelous) - 65.620
- [NSW] Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity (Koei Tecmo) - 62.119
- [NSW] Samurai Warriors 5 (Koei Tecmo) - 61.350
- [NSW] The Battle Cats Unite! (Ponos) - 61.247
- [PS4] The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Dark (Nihon Falcom) - 60.435
- [PS5] Tales of Arise (Bandai Namco) - 60.106
- [NSW] Super Bomberman R (Konami) - 57.189
- [PS4] Judgment [New Price Edition] (Sega) - 53.086
- [PS4] Far Cry 6 (Ubisoft) - 51.764
- [NSW] FIFA 22: Legacy Edition (Electronic Arts) - 51.764
- [NSW] Fortnite: Minty Legends Pack (Epic Games) - 47.799
- [PS4] FIFA 22 (Electronic Arts) - 45.058
- [NSW] Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (Sega) - 40.688
- [PS5] Lost Judgment (Sega) - 36.584
- [NSW] Disney Magical World 2 (Bandai Namco) - 36.352
- [NSW] Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 (Sega) - 36.105
- [PS4] Battlefield 2042 (Electronic Arts) - 35.375
- [NSW] Family Trainer (Bandai Namco) - 35.273
- [PS4] Scarlet Nexus (Bandai Namco) - 31.665
- [PS5] Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade (Square Enix) - 30.984
NSW - 32
PS4 - 14
PS5 - 4
TOTAL: 8.972.167
NSW: 7.416.166 (82.7%)
PS4: 1.355.566 (15.1%)
PS5: 200.435 (2.2%)
Top 10 Publishers:
- Capcom - 2.842.991 (31.7%)
- Konami - 1.661.146 (18.5%)
- Bandai Namco - 912.609 (10.2%)
- Microsoft - 805.351 (9%)
- Other - 778.923 (8.7%)
- Marvelous - 503.310 (5.6%)
- Square Enix - 463.176 (5.2%)
- Sega - 343.794 (3.8%)
- Aniplex - 306.575 (3.4%)
- Koei Tecmo - 196.196 (2.2%)
- Atlus - 184.388 (2.1%)
Square Enix just had it's worst ever year in Japan, finishing below Marvelous and Microsoft and outside the Top 5 Third Party Publishers in the unofficial Top 50 ranking for third party games.
It just seems like wishful thinking on some people's part that they would gamble on making DQXII exclusive to see sales below 1 million for a franchise that's viewed as a failure if it doesn't managed 3 million in Japan. If Strangers in Paradise and Forespoken under-perform their expectations in Japan, the potential performance of FFXVI in the near future as a PS5 exclusive might not even be 1/2 of what FFXV managed.
People are underestimating how quickly PS has faded into irrelevance and what a huge blow it would be for any title that does the majority of the sales in the country to be exclusive to the system while shunning the Switch.
PlayStation ecosystem as a whole saw over 50% decline YoY and worst result for software since they entered the market. Since the majority of software sales on the PS are third party games it basically was a hug hit to their biggest supporters in Japan. 2022 isn't going to be much better if the scalping to other countries persists; the level of PS5 software sales will not make up the decline of PS4 software in 2022 - not by a long shot. Even with a stronger line-up for H1 a lot of the games slated for the PS aren't huge sellers in Japan - GT for example used to sell a million but the new entry might not even surpass 200K; Horizon is likely to see the same decline other Western games have experience(50% or more); Forespoken is likely not to even clear 50K as a PS5 exclusive Western game.
Elden Ring is by far the biggest game in my opinion launching during H1 of this year and the PS5 version isn't guaranteed to even hit 150K, what does this say about the future of a platform exclusive Dragon Quest XII... well it can happen if Sony buy Square Enix and the DQ rights from Horii, but if they make such a move it lead to counter-bids and as a whole Horii might decide to sell the rights to a different company leaving Sony with games that are selling best on the PS anyways(Final Fantasy & Western Square subsidiaries) - so the acquisition doesn't make sense unless it's defensive, like Nintendo/Microsoft/Tencent etc trying to make a move to buy Square.
For comparision this is the Top 50 Official Results per Famitsu for 2020
Third Party Top 50, 2020 (Official)
TOTAL: 8.07M
NSW TOTAL: 4.36M (54%)
PS4 TOTAL: 3.71M (46%)
Top 10 Publishers in Top 50 2020
- Konami - 1.821.772 (22.5%)
- Square Enix - 1.444.036 (17.9%)
- Bandai Namco - 1.158.166 (14.3%)
- Other - 815.636 (10.1%)
- Sega - 635.600 (7.9%)
- Microsoft - 633.766 (7.8%)
- Koei Tecmo - 524.423 (6.5%)
- Capcom - 404.529 (5%)
- Atlus - 375.003 (4.6%)
- Marvelous - 145.819 (1.8%)
- Cygames - 127.566 (1.6%)