Bravely Second was released in Japan last week, and the RPG sold 100,047 copies at launch. Japanese sales tracker Media Create reports that it sold through just 53.63% of its initial shipment.
In comparison, Bravely Default sold 141,529 copies at launch, selling through 85.68% of its shipment, and then went on to sell consistently in the months that followed, eventually reaching 400,000 units in sales (presumably with the help of its For the Sequel re-release). The game attracted a wide audience consisting of fans of the older Final Fantasy games, as well as adults in their 30s and beyond that like RPGs in general.
Meanwhile, Bravely Second is a direct sequel to Bravely Default, which means its appeal is limited to those that played the previous game. However, in addition to the story connection with the first game, Second also appears rather iterative and doesn’t seem to do anything new that the first title hadn’t already largely explored. This, too, could be a factor that limited sales of the new game.
With Japan’s Golden Week holiday ongoing, Bravely Second does have a chance to see fairly reasonable sales in its second week. That’s probably partly why Square Enix sent out such a large shipment (over 186,000 units) for the game—at least some of those copies are bound to sell during Golden Week. That said, there’s little doubt that the game will not reach the heights that Bravely Default did in terms of sales numbers.
Published: May 1, 2015 01:59 pm