The Witcher 3 – as one of the most celebrated games to have come out this console generation – was already a very high-selling game, but in 2019, CD Projekt RED and Saber Interactive did the impossible and put the game on the Switch as well. And whether it was because of the surprising quality of the port, or because of the sheer novelty of having The Witcher 3 in your pocket, or combination of both, but the game’s Switch version ended up selling very well.
In a new report, the NPD Group put that success in perspective. According to the NP Group, The Witcher 3’s Switch launch coincided with a massive surge in sales for the game in Q4 2019, to the extent that it sold a whopping 554 per cent more copies in December 2019 than it did in December 2018.
Of course, Netflix’s The Witcher series has been a factor in the game’s resurgent popularity as well, and we’ve had plenty of evidence for that over the past couple of months. In fact, according to the NPD group, thanks to the Netflix series, even if we take the Switch port out of consideration, the game’s sales still enjoyed a 63 per cent YoY increase- not nearly as impressive, but still nothing to scoff at.
CD Projekt RED will only be hoping Cyberpunk 2077 can have the kind of longevity that The Witcher 3 clearly has.