As far as reviews go, people who bought Kirby Air Riders seem to be enjoying it quite a bit. However, as the UK physical gaming charts indicate (h/t Nintendo Life), the game is not selling well in terms of physical copies. Last week, when the game launched, it was at the 12th spot for physical game sales in the UK. This week, it’s not even in the top 40.
That’s quite the dramatic fall off, especially when the top 40 for this week includes Lego Horizon Adventures (a year-old game) at the 38th spot. Even more surprising is that Kirby was outranked by relatively niche games like Bluey: The Videogame and Dog Man: Mission Impawsible. The worst part is that since the list ends at #40, we have no idea where Kirby Air Riders stands as of now.
Is Kirby Air Riders A Flop In The West?
According to Famitsu, Kirby Air Riders sold over 195,000 units in Japan during its first week, debuting at the top spot for physical sales in the country. So it’s by no means a complete commercial flop, as the UK news would have you believe. But it does beg a different question: is Kirby not as important to the Western audience?
A better explanation may be that Air Riders simply isn’t a mainline Kirby platformer, the genre that this series is best known for. Forgotten Land sold over 7 million copies, making it the best-selling Kirby game in history. Crucially, it was a full 3D platformer marketed as a flagship Nintendo release. The original Kirby Air Ride was a spinoff racing title with a more experimental design, and the same goes for the successor.
Experimentation is nothing new for this series. The catalog is full of genre curveballs: racing, rhythm titles, claymation, drawing, roguelite, and more. Historically, these spin-offs tend to perform differently depending on the region. In Japan, Kirby is seen as a top-tier Nintendo mascot. In the West, he’s closer to a mid-tier icon whose non-platfomer releases appeal to a smaller audience.
Besides, it may be too early to label the game a Western flop just yet. Digital sales aren’t included in the UK physical chart, and it could turn out that this game has a longer tail rather than an explosive launch. Regardless, don’t let this sway you away from what is an excellent game that features immense creativity in its game design.
