Koei Tecmo talks Pokemon Pokopia, wanted to make the best-selling Pokemon spin-off
Koei Tecmo talks Pokemon Pokopia, wanted to make the best-selling Pokemon spin-off
Posted on July 11, 2026 by Brian(@NE_Brian)
in News, Switch 2
Koei Tecmo has shared a few comments about Pokemon Pokopia’s massive success, including some lofty sales hopes the company had back when it was working on the project
Famitsu recently spoke with Koei Tecmo president and CEO Hisashi Koinuma in a wide-ranging interview. Of course, it was only natural for Pokemon Pokopia to come up during the interview
When Famitsu brought up how Pokemon Pokopia has likely been one of the more particularly rewarding collaborative projects that he’s recently worked on, Koinuma said:
“From among our spin-off titles I do feel a strong sense of accomplishment. We did work with the aim to make it the best selling spin-off game, but before launch there weren’t any real expectations (laughs). However, directly ahead of launch, lots of overseas media played it and rated it very highly, and then I felt it spread from there.”
Koinuma was further asked if this is the perfect fertile ground for making these kinds of spin-off games. He said in response:
“Yes it is. In the past when we worked with Square Enix on Dragon Quest Builders 2, we experimented with trial and error to see if the crafting elements that our company makes could be smoothly added to the game. I think that because of that experience the Omega Force brand has been able to grow its area of expertise beyond the Warriors series and into crafting games.”
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team and Blue Rescue Team are currently the highest-selling spin-offs at 5.85 million copies.
Koei Tecmo will likely reach its sales goal soon – if it hasn’t already. We previously heard that over four million copies were sold through the first five weeks. That information was shared at the start of May, so the total is definitely higher than that
Pokemon Pokopia is set to receive a new update and the first part of its Expansion Pass DLC in August. Read more about that here
Translation provided by Simon Griffin and SatsumaFS on behalf of Nintendo Everything
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