I hope you're right, but, you're nuts.

Just out of curiosity, do we know official Bayonetta 3 numbers?

EDIT: I see a comment earlier mentioned the sales.

I would have loved to see Xenoblade 3, Bayonetta 3 and Astral Chain sell more.

They are amazing games and I bought all of three, but let's face it, nothing indicated that they were going to sell better than they did. They had limited sales potential from the beginning:

Bayonetta: The franchise released on PS3/360 and did not succeed, it sold more but was heavilty discounted and the serie was on the verge to be cancelled until Nintendo saved it. Bayonetta 2 did modest numbers on Wii U and its port also did not sell very well on Switch. Bayonetta 3 is selling on par with expectations and the potential of the serie.

Astral Chain: It's like Bayonetta, but without any previous game and zero reputation. It had no potential. These single player beat them all action game are not the genre who are selling the best.

Now we can speak about Xenoblade: The serie has had 4 installments with X , plus one major stand alone side game (Torna). I bought all 5. It has become a very respected serie in the gaming world, one of the most known RPG among enthusiasts. But the serie has been going on and the sales are staying around the same ballpark for the 2 and the 3, with the remake being close behind. It seems that the franchise has hit its current ceiling and that qality alone won't push it further.

There is limited market possibility for a big story centred JRPG with complex fighting mecanics and systems. I lik this serie a lot and I would rather see Monolith continuing doing its own thing than chasing trends in order to try to improve the sales. Of course, I would like the serie to hit 5 millions but that's unlikely.

And I agree with those who said that Xenoblade isn't generic. You can watch a few screens and immediately say that it's Xenoblade, it doesnt look like anything else.

Now for Labo, did people really expected it to seel big numbers? It's not even a true videogame and its cardboard based. It looked cheap and only destined to very young children.

I have seen people talking about DKTF, it sold 4.1 millions, it doubled the sales of the Wii U version , and people like me who owned the game on Wii U probably passed. I guess that the game being a port, Nintendo skipped most of the advertizement to newer product.

I think that with a bigger marketing push and the release of a new game , DK 2D game could do 6-7 millions. But Retro seems to have move back to Metroid.

It's always hard to evaluate late port sales potential.

Wind Waker HD did alright but we were starving on Wii U and without any true Zelda and Twilight Princess straight flopped. I would say that Zelda ports are hit and miss. OOT on DS sold very well  and became a flagship title.

Personnally I almost never buy port/remakes of games that I have already played.

I don't feel like massive world by itself is something unique I mean... there is quite a lot open world games nowadays, so being a big world in scope while nice is hard to be seen as a selling point. Other JRPGs have done it as well, like Final Fantasy XV. I get you like the game a lot, but nothing you are telling me strikes me as something you cannot find anywhere else. 

A made a list of things that are easily perceived by customers. What is the other RPG where you can control Disney characters or play in Disney worlds? None, only Kingdom Hearts have this. JRPG with heavy focus on school life social sim aspecfd? Persona. Those are selling points that you can see in a minute just watching a trailer. Xenoblade do not gave any of this. Take a Star Ocean trailer and a Xenoblade trailer and give it to someone who never played either and the answer is likely to be "ok, they are similar"

It's not that Xenoblade is worse than Star Ocean, but the presentation and marketing surrounding Xenoblade games makes hard to get people who never played Xenoblade and convince the people that the game is really worth a try. It lacks a "It" factor, and this factor is what preventing it to break a more mainstream audience, despite the heavy review from both critics and fans. 

I also must add that I've played Xenoblade remaster, so while I understand gameplay elements I'm familiar maybe came originally from Xenoblade the fact I've experienced them in other games are making me fail to have an better opinion about Xenoblade specifically. 

Xenoblade 4 can be the best game ever made, if Nintendo and Monolith are not able to find anything to sell that can make the average gamer see the game as unavailable I don't see it selling anything more than the average ~1.5 million. Is that a problem? Not really, I guess it's enough for the game to pay itself and keep the franchise afloat. Will Nintendo always be satisfied with this level of popularity? I dunno, I think so but we shall see 

Twilight Princess was present on Wii and Wii U was backwards compatible. Needless to say, it was kind like a low effort remaster. 1 million copies is much more than what this travesty really deserved 

I think Nintendo keeps financing games like Xenoblade, Bayonetta and Astral Chain to keep the library of the Switch with diversity and to keep critical acclaim, for them it's important to not repeat the Wii years when they started to turn too much toward the casual crowd at the end of the console.

They want people to know that there are more serious looking game on Switch. That's why they are bringing back Metroid too, despite the serie not selling as much as other series.

It's all about finding a good balance. Nintendo release somes games to make a lot of money and other to build the library.

Nintendo would love Bayonetta or Xenoblade to have a big breakout moment, but that not why the series are continued.

I think Monolith should try to make an original IP next, something with a slightly less anime art style and simplify the battle systems but keep a lot of what makes Xenoblade good otherwise.

X was much less anime and was less story centred with your own customized avatar.

But it's gigantic true open world was a budget and time sink. I think Takahashi mentionned it and it's probably why it wasn't ported to Switch.