Falcom says Ys VIII for Switch met sales expectations in the west, but “struggled in Japan”
According to Nihon Falcom president Toshihiro Kondo, Ys VIII met sales expectations on Switch in the west. In Japan, though, “the game struggled”.
Kondo passed along that bit of news in an interview with Noisy Pixel. When asked if Nihon Falcom would ever consider any exclusive games for Switch, Kondo stated:
“When it comes to the Switch, we recognize the system’s dual functionality, our games really match these mobile platforms especially for players who might not have access to their own personal televisions. Being able to play our games whenever a fan wants, is something appealing to us and to the fans. In terms of exclusivity, as nice as it would be, the truth of the matter is finding where the user base is. When it comes to Ys VIII, we released it on Switch. While western sales for the Switch version were right around where we thought they’d be, the game struggled in Japan, which reinforced to us that our user base is on PlayStation.”
Kondo also reiterated that it’s more interested in having other studios port Falcom games to Switch so that the company can focus on creating new games:
“In a practical sense, we have never actually developed a game on Switch, so that would take us a large number of resources and have us starting from zero, which would take time away from developing games. So, we leave the porting to our partners. There’s a misconception in Japan from fans, that there’s bad blood between Nintendo and Falcom, but that’s not the case at all. We’d love to have more of a working relationship with them, but we don’t have the means to develop on the platform.”
