Splatoon 3 is the fastest selling game launch in Japan ever

Splatoon 3 is doing incredibly well in Japan, so well in fact it is now the fastest selling game in the country.

Earlier today (September 12), Nintendo Japan shared that Splatoon 3 has sold more than 3.45 million copies in its first three days of sale, made up of both physical and digital copies. To put things into perspective, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, one of Nintendo’s best selling games, sold 1.88 million copies in the same time frame. Meaning Splatoon 3 has sold almost double that of New Horizons.

But as industry analyst Daniel Ahmad points out, it isn’t just the best launch for a Switch game in Japan, it’s the best launch for any game in Japan. The previous record holder was Pokémon Black and White, which sold more than 2.6 million copies in its first two days on sale, and only selling a touch more than that in its first week. Which still puts Splatoon 3 ahead just by just under a million.

It’s an incredibly impressive figure, and potentially sets up the third entry in the series for a good launch week.

Over in the UK Splatoon 3 has debuted at number one on the boxed charts, though as GamesIndustry.biz reports, launch sales are actually down by 9% compared to the previous entry, but as noted in the report this only factors in boxed sales, so it is possible digital sales are higher this time around.

In VG247’s review of Splatoon 3, we spoke about how the third game is essentially more of what you like, but better, in particular noting how the single-player content is much better than the previous two games, saying “The stages themselves are where I was most surprised. There’s a good mix here. Many of the early stages function as tutorials for how various weapons and concepts of Splatoon work – you will leave the campaign far better equipped for heading online without shaming yourself performance-wise after playing it.”