2023's best RPG so far was a big sales disappointment in Japan

gamesradar.com:

Octopath Traveler 2 has debuted to disappointing sales in Japan.

Square Enix's RPG sequel only just launched last week on February 24, but game sales data has already been reported from Japan, courtesy of the Game Data Library tweet just below. Octopath Traveler 2 has reportedly sold just 78,000 copies across PS5, PS4, and Nintendo Switch in its first week on the market.

Retail launch of Octopath Traveler II see a 30% drop in comparison to the first one in Japan, with the Switch version dropping nearly half its sales.Second weakest launch of a Team Asano game, above, but not by a lot, over last year's Live A Live remake. pic.twitter.com/X319ythIOOMarch 2, 2023

This figure means Octopath Traveler 2 is the second-weakest Team Asano game launch in Japan at retail. It's beaten in that category only by 2022's Live A Live remake, which sold around 71,000 copies at launch in Japan. Live-A-Live only launched on Nintendo Switch though, where's Octopath Traveler 2 is now available across PlayStation and Nintendo Switch.

What's more, Octopath Traveler 2 is the only multi-platform Team Asano game. The likes of Bravely Default 2 and Triangle Strategy are exclusive Nintendo Switch games, and even they've both beaten out Octopath Traveler 2 in debut weekly sales at retail in Japan, and by quite some margin, going by the statistics from Game Data Library above.

This is no doubt really disappointing for Square Enix. What makes it all the more confounding is that Octopath Traveler 2 is actually a really good sequel from Team Asano, a more refined RPG that improves upon the original in nearly every way. That it's failed to shift a significant amount of copies, enough to beat the original Octopath Traveler, is a big shame.

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