It’s a good year for JRPGs, a revival of the genre that hasn’t been seen in recent memories. From the smashing success of Monster Hunter World and the release of Dragon Quest XI in the West to the Nintendo powerhouses of Xenoblade Chronicles 2 DLC and Octopath Traveler and even Valkyria Chronicles 4, the genre has enjoyed a surge in popularity that has yet to slow down.
Xenoblade 2 was released December of last year, and along with the new DLC Torna: The Golden Country, the title saw success worldwide; especially surprising to Executive Director Tetsuya Takahashi was its success in territories outside of Japan.
In recent phone interview with USGamer, Takahashi said, “from a sales perspective, I have to say Xenoblade Chronicles 2 exceeded my expectations.” He went on to specify that he “really saw more people pick the game up and experience it in the North American and European territories than [he] thought would do so.”
The DLC seems to be doing well too. Though Takahashi remains cryptic about future installments of the series, it would seem that the sale numbers more or less translate to the possibility of a third title. Takahashi says that there would be a variety of options going forward, one of which includes taking the series down a different style, one that “it hasn’t gone down before.”
The popularity of the Nintendo Switch, especially, has played a critical role in escalating the hype for these types of games. When Octopath Traveler released earlier this summer, the sale numbers far exceeded that of the developers, and shocked the supply chain of large distributors as well. With shortages of physical copies in both Japan and the West, it seems demand for the title heralded trends to come.
With more than a million units sold and positive reactions toward the DLC, it may not be long before another entry comes along for the popular JRPG series, undoubtedly now one of Nintendo’s modern flagship IPs.