Sonic Frontiers Sells 2.5 Million, Becoming One of the Fastest Selling Sonic Games of All Time

Congratulations Sega/Sonic Team for achieving this! Sonic is officially back.

The absolute win on this one ! The game is a mess but I love it dearly since it's so much fun and you can feel the very soul and spirit of Sonic Team (and the Sonic series) in this game ! It's the best kind of 7-8/10 game ! With that said, there are a lot of issues with it; some of them due to a lack of budget and lo and behold, the game is selling well enough that Sonic Team has a good chance of being expanded for the next game ! This is the fastest selling Sonic game since Adventure 1 or the genesis days ! It's kind of insane.

I believe that makes it the fastest selling game in the series since Sonic 2. Very strong result on the whole. It took a critically acclaimed game like Mania almost a year to sell a million copies, and while that game was digital only, I think Frontiers' results speak to how much the brand's strength has increased considerably in recent years. The open zone concept was also probably very attractive to people, people just like big, ambitious games these days.

I think it will probably end somewhere at about 4-6mil copies sold. Updates and the holiday cycles it will go through, alongside the generally positive reception and the strong legs that Sonic games oftentimes have, means that it should sell well for a number of years.

Glad it sold well. 

Wish it was a better game. 

That's great! When was the last time a Sonic game sold so well, so quickly that SEGA publicly announced it? This is it. This will be what gives SEGA the incentive to start putting more money into Sonic games. A bigger team, more dev time. Maybe even having other companies make spin-off titles? #SonicSweep2027

Seeing Somic Sweep constantly makes me realize how desperate some people are for Sonic Ws...kinda sad.

Anyways, I'm glad Frontiers is doing well even if it looks....like Frontiers.

3 minutes ago, DaBigJ said:

Seeing Somic Sweep constantly makes me realize how desperate some people are for Sonic Ws...kinda sad.

Eh, I really don't think we need to look for the negativity in things and assume that's desperation.

In all honesty, Sonic's had a good year that's earned its kudos, and serves a good sign of a return of quality, so we're to a point where all branches of the franchise are being celebrated with well-earned reception.

10 minutes ago, DaBigJ said:

Seeing Somic Sweep constantly makes me realize how desperate some people are for Sonic Ws...kinda sad.

Anyways, I'm glad Frontiers is doing well even if it looks....like Frontiers.

This franchise has been taking too many Ls as it is.

I would know, I was around for all of them. At least the most notable ones, that is.

If people enjoy Frontiers, then it's a well earned W.

When I talk about Sonic Swep I'm mainly talking about the annoying people who spam it constantly and go on and on about how good Sonic fans are eating this year. It's just so annoying, y'know? Just enjoy the content, y'don't need to brag about it that much and call it a sweep.  

1 minute ago, DaBigJ said:

When I talk about Sonic Swep I'm mainly talking about the annoying people who spam it constantly and go on and on about how good Sonic fans are eating this year. It's just so annoying, y'know? Just enjoy the content, y'don't need to brag about it that much and call it a sweep.  

Honestly, blame Morbius. Ever since that dumb movie, the whole sense of "sweep" when a franchise succeeds became popular. Granted, people kinda forgot that it's supposed to be "ironic" given how Morbius ended up failing despite the hype.

Still, I don't really see any harm done with it honestly. It's just people showing their excitement that the Sonic franchise is finally back on the rise.

Well congrats to the devs. Nice to see the series get another win this year.

I just pray this further sends the message to Sega to staff up and give ST a lot more resources for the next game. While Frontiers has a good foundation to work from, they really need to step it up for the next game. Like everyone has said on here, there's a lot they need to fix/update/add.

Please don't get complacent.

Just now, Strickerx5 said:

Well congrats to the devs. Nice to see the series get another win this year.

I just pray this further sends the message to Sega to staff up and give ST a lot more resources for the next game. While Frontiers has a good foundation to work from, they really need to step it up for the next game. Like everyone has said on here, there's a lot they need to fix/update/add.

Please don't get complacent.

I swear, if despite all the praise and sales, they somehow come to the conclusion to change, that will be the official sign that someone in charge there is legitimately insane.

1 minute ago, Strickerx5 said:

Well congrats to the devs. Nice to see the series get another win this year.

I just pray this further sends the message to Sega to staff up and give ST a lot more resources for the next game. While Frontiers has a good foundation to work from, they really need to step it up for the next game. Like everyone has said on here, there's a lot they need to fix/update/add.

Please don't get complacent.

If there's one thing I can hand to Kishimoto, it's that complacent isn't his MO for Sonic at all. Forces felt like it, but that also had a lot of development meddling. He mentioned that he had the concept of Super Sonic fighting titans in his head before Forces (I can't remember whether it was during SLW or Generations) so he built a game around it. The "Mario Galaxy" clone of SLW may have felt like it was cribbing Mario success for the sake of it, but it was also driven by Kishimoto experimenting with ways to keep the camera facing forwards while also allowing full 360 exploration on the tubes, and pushing the platforming mechanics further with it. Forces was Forces but it also appears to be built off the premise of the custom character first and foremost, and Colors and Black Knight were hardly complacent mechanically.

Honestly some complacence would be nice if they used it to refine the formula rather than choose anything drastic, like the combat and titans Frontiers took on, but for some reason I doubt that will stop his design sensibilities from honing in on another idea for the sake of it. We'll see how it goes though lol

I may have some feelings about this game, but I gotta give credit where its due. 

Yaaayyy!!! Congrats on this game really succeeding!  That's quite a win for Sonic the Hedgehog! 

58 minutes ago, DaBigJ said:

Seeing Somic Sweep constantly makes me realize how desperate some people are for Sonic Ws...kinda sad.

Anyways, I'm glad Frontiers is doing well even if it looks....like Frontiers.

I say it out of a mix of genuine hope, and irony at the not-very-off-chance things could go badly again.

14 minutes ago, The Deleter said:

If there's one thing I can hand to Kishimoto, it's that complacent isn't his MO for Sonic at all. Forces felt like it, but that also had a lot of development meddling. He mentioned that he had the concept of Super Sonic fighting titans in his head before Forces (I can't remember whether it was during SLW or Generations) so he built a game around it.

Honestly, stuff like that makes me wonder if we were supposed to get better and more proper fights with the giant Death Egg mechs in that game, especially given how hyped they were in that first trailer.

1 hour ago, The Deleter said:

The "Mario Galaxy" clone of SLW may have felt like it was cribbing Mario success for the sake of it, but it was also driven by Kishimoto experimenting with ways to keep the camera facing forwards while also allowing full 360 exploration on the tubes, and pushing the platforming mechanics further with it. Forces was Forces but it also appears to be built off the premise of the custom character first and foremost, and Colors and Black Knight were hardly complacent mechanically.

Honestly some complacence would be nice if they used it to refine the formula rather than choose anything drastic, like the combat and titans Frontiers took on, but for some reason I doubt that will stop his design sensibilities from honing in on another idea for the sake of it. We'll see how it goes though lol

Honestly, while hating on Kishimoto was the popular thing to do, I never really bought into the idea that he was unfit for the series. He was just a persistent dev who was constantly given, less than ideal circumstances with each project; which has some credence to it, given how Frontiers is a sign of what Sonic Team can do when SEGA aren't forcing them to rush things for an anniversary release date.

I think Kishimoto was always the bright-eyed dev head that Sonic needed. He showed it with Colors, that's for certain. He just needed another proper chance to really soar. And I believe that Frontiers is a sign of his own redemption arc, along with that of Sonic Team, finally being freed from the shackles of crunch hopefully.

Best 3D sonic game since Adventure in my book. Great story, good music, all I ever wanted. And now canon to the comics. What a time to be alive. Hope the next game is just as amazing and even bigger........just hope it wont take 5 years. Ill be dead one day and like to play as much as I can.

4 hours ago, Wraith said:

For reference, Sonic Generations couldn't achieve this result after 6 months on the market. This will definitely go down as the fastest selling Sonic title in a while. Amazing what an actual marketing strategy will do.

Warm take that I mentioned earlier in another forum when November NPD results came in (where Frontiers also did much, much better compared to historical Sonic entries). But I'd say Frontiers' sales performance owes much of the credit, if not most of it, towards the live-action movies. At least in the sense of the films being widely promoted in mainstream circles by Paramount, and the films themselves being box-office hits. Without them, I imagine Frontiers' performance would be closer towards the norm of past Sonic games.

Nonetheless. Mania notwithstanding, Sega stopped reporting sales numbers for Sonic games after the failure of the Boom games. (And even then, Mania's numbers were not through Sega themselves, via IR reports or official PR--it was via an magazine interview with Iizuka.) So for Frontiers selling well enough for Sega to break that trend is actually surprising.

Moreover, any guesses that this is the fastest-selling and/or best-selling Sonic game in years are likely spot on the money. It took Unleashed roughly two months to sell somewhat less copies (2.027 million, as seen in Sega's FY2008 third quarter report) than Frontiers has now sold in a month; and that was all the way back in late 2008/early 2009. Up until now, Unleashed (2.45M) has remained the peak for Sonic game sales (that are neither mobile games, nor part of the Mario & Sonic Olympics series) ever since the start of 7th generation.

Assuming Frontiers continues to sell well into 2023, I think there is a good chance it could surpass three million copies by the time third quarter results are posted for FY2022. Which would easily put it as the best-selling Sonic game (again discounting mobile games, the Mario & Sonic series, and the Mega Collection [Plus] compilation) ever since Sega and the series went third-party.

To think the marketing for this game started off so poorly; it's surprising how well they managed to turn it around. Good stuff. Frontiers has it's lion's share of flaws but it's definitely going to be the SA2 of this generation.

1 hour ago, Indigo Rush said:

To think the marketing for this game started off so poorly; it's surprising how well they managed to turn it around. Good stuff. Frontiers has it's lion's share of flaws but it's definitely going to be the SA2 of this generation.

SEGA are right about it being the "next generation" of Sonic games, at least in terms of audience and cultural impact (cause Lord knows its not in terms of gameplay). Makes me wonder how their going to capitalise on the success though. Sonic marketing has been absolute crap for a long time, and they missed a bunch of opportunities for brand awareness surrounding the movies and even Boom.

Frontiers is the big new first game since the movies. I think that everyone is right when they say that the movies influenced its performance, and that's a really good thing. The next movie is out Christmas 2024, so we're still two years off yet. The movie will also feature Shadow, the most marketable character after Sonic himself. If SEGA want to go down the obvious route here, we'll get the next big game in 2024 and it'll feature Shadow too. 

The next brand new game might not be 2024 though. In fact, I kind of hope that it's not. 2023 is going to be Frontiers DLC, so 2024 could be a stop gap game (ala TSR, Colours Ultimate and Origins) and 2025 could be the next game instead. I don't want the next game to be undercooked or rushed in any way, and releasing at the same time as the movie clearly isn't essential from the looks of things. Just space the series out to keep the momentum going. 

9 hours ago, The Deleter said:

If there's one thing I can hand to Kishimoto, it's that complacent isn't his MO for Sonic at all. Forces felt like it, but that also had a lot of development meddling. He mentioned that he had the concept of Super Sonic fighting titans in his head before Forces (I can't remember whether it was during SLW or Generations) so he built a game around it. The "Mario Galaxy" clone of SLW may have felt like it was cribbing Mario success for the sake of it, but it was also driven by Kishimoto experimenting with ways to keep the camera facing forwards while also allowing full 360 exploration on the tubes, and pushing the platforming mechanics further with it. Forces was Forces but it also appears to be built off the premise of the custom character first and foremost, and Colors and Black Knight were hardly complacent mechanically.

 

Disagree. Every Sonic game has a new central gimmick they revolve around but Kishimoto is imo the least willing to actually commit to a new idea. Most of his games fall back hard on existing frameworks even if they don't mesh with the new idea well. 

Colors and Black Knight technically feature new ideas, but they were sloppily implemented on top of the existing framework which lead to all kinds of issues a more creative director could have avoided. Even Lost World seemed to approach 3D Sonic with the attitude that all the solutions Nintendo came up with for Mario would fit Sonic, only for it to come crashing with the reality of such a creatively lazy solution. I won't count Forces since reports indicate whatever new ideas they had were veto'd and then scaled back but I would be lying if I said I expected much from the original concept. 

Frontiers contains both the freshes concepts he's come up with and is the most he was willing to change the existing framework to fit his new ideas. The boost controls were overhauled for open world exploration in a smart way and the new combat system means the Super Sonic fights feel more integrated into the gameplay and less like the loose end they were in other games. Even with all of that praise the cyberspace levels still feel like an undercooked loose end. A strange commitment to the old gameplay when there didn't need to be one. 

1 hour ago, Blue Blood said:

SEGA are right about it being the "next generation" of Sonic games, at least in terms of audience and cultural impact (cause Lord knows its not in terms of gameplay). Makes me wonder how their going to capitalise on the success though. Sonic marketing has been absolute crap for a long time, and they missed a bunch of opportunities for brand awareness surrounding the movies and even Boom.

Frontiers is the big new first game since the movies. I think that everyone is right when they say that the movies influenced its performance, and that's a really good thing. The next movie is out Christmas 2024, so we're still two years off yet. The movie will also feature Shadow, the most marketable character after Sonic himself. If SEGA want to go down the obvious route here, we'll get the next big game in 2024 and it'll feature Shadow too. 

The next brand new game might not be 2024 though. In fact, I kind of hope that it's not. 2023 is going to be Frontiers DLC, so 2024 could be a stop gap game (ala TSR, Colours Ultimate and Origins) and 2025 could be the next game instead. I don't want the next game to be undercooked or rushed in any way, and releasing at the same time as the movie clearly isn't essential from the looks of things. Just space the series out to keep the momentum going. 

Hmm, it depends. The most substantial part of the DLC isn't gonna be until next Fall possibly, so most of 2023 is gonna be naff until then.

2024 I could see them releasing an SA2 remake to coincide with the movie as to serve as a reintroduction to Shadow, but I don't know if that would spoil some plot points for the movie.

Sega have a lot of options on the table, so let's see how they capitalize. 

I have my doubts about a new Sonic Team game coming by 2024, unless them staffing up makes that much of a difference in the development pipeline, but I can see 2025 pretty easily.

I really enjoyed Sonic Frontiers, so I'm glad it did well.

Hopefully this means a lot of the elements of this game - from the gameplay to the writing - will remain in place going forward.