Ever since EA Sports' former Chief Competition Officer Peter Moore revealed that FIFA 18 would be custom built for the Nintendo Switch, fans of both the Big N and the incredibly popular soccer simulation franchise were curious to see if it would be worth a day one purchase for the console. Now, with the latest entry in the long-running series having launched worldwide last Friday, it looks as if its debut on the system wasn't as successful as its creators had hoped, with the Nintendo SKU having taken less than 3% of sales in the UK.
This much has been revealed thanks to the United Kingdom market research company known as Gfk Chart-Track, with the firm divulging that despite FIFA 18 being the number one selling game in the UK at the moment, sales figures for the Nintendo Switch version were lower than that of any other current-generation console. As it so happens, the PlayStation 4 iteration took the lion's share, with 60% of sales being generated through the Sony console, while Xbox One copies followed with more than a third of all sales.
Furthermore, GfK Chart-Track notes that FIFA 18's launch sales were down by 25% year-on-year, and the company stated that this may be due to the rise of digital sales through both the PlayStation Store and Xbox Games Store. Plus, the analysts mention that with the digital store for the Nintendo Switch having been proven as a popular feature, it's quite possible that sales of FIFA 18 may be higher on the platform than the physical charts indicate.
FIFA 18's debut at number one on the sales charts knocks Bungie's Destiny 2 down to second place for the first time since it launched at the beginning of September, with the science fiction shooter sequel's sales dropping 26% week-on-week. Not to mention, Bandai Namco's Project Cars 2 falls to the number seven slot with less than half the sales it managed at launch. Those interested can find top 10 selling games in the UK for this week below.
- FIFA 18
- Destiny 2
- Forza Horizon 3
- NBA 2K18
- Grand Theft Auto 5
- Crash Bandicoot: N.Sane Trilogy
- Project Cars 2
- Uncharted: The Lost Legacy
- Lego Worlds
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
Taking all of this into account, it makes sense as to why the Nintendo Switch version of FIFA 18 didn't score as well with fans as it did on the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. For starters, not only does the Switch version have missing features when compared to its PS4 and Xbox One counterparts, but also the install base for both Sony and Microsoft's systems are much higher than that of Nintendo's console, thus making FIFA 18 on PS4 and Xbox One more preferable at the moment. Perhaps when EA Sports makes organized multiplayer matchmaking an official feature on the Switch, sales of the game on the system will start to grow.
FIFA 18 is available now for Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One.
Source: GamesIndustry.biz