Kingdom Hearts breaks 10m

By Robert Purchese Published 7 February, 2007

Franchise flexes large sales.

Joining the ranks of super-successful game franchises today is Kingdom Hearts, which boasts more than 10 million units sold across the world.

The series is made up of three games - Kingdom Hearts, released for PS2 in 2002; Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, for GBA in 2005; and the recent Kingdom Hearts II, which launched last year for PS2.

Europe contributed over two million sales to the total figure, with Japan passing three million and the US exceeding five and a half million.

Kingdom Hearts, created by Square Enix, pops a traditional Japanese role-playing game in a blender with Walt Disney characters and produces an action-RPG that's met critical success around the planet. We were thoroughly charmed by the latest release, and you can catch up with our review elsewhere on the site.

"When we first started developing Kingdom Hearts, we never imagined we would pass the 10 million mark so quickly," said series producer Shinji Hashimoto. "We are delighted and extremely grateful for the support from our fans around the globe. We hope to continue to provide games which fulfill your anticipation in the future."

So, well done indeed, but it's still a little off the pace of the all-time giants: the clear leaders being Mario with 193 million, and Pokémon with 155 million. Read on for a full top-20 list of the biggest franchises in gaming history courtesy of The Independent.

  1. Mario: 193 million.
  2. Pokémon: 155 million
  3. Final Fantasy: 68 million
  4. Madden NFL: 56 million
  5. The Sims: 54 million
  6. Grand Theft Auto: 50 million
  7. Donkey Kong: 48 million
  8. The Legend of Zelda: 47 million
  9. Sonic the Hedgehog: 44 million
  10. Gran Turismo' 44 million
  11. Lineage: 43 million
  12. Dragon Quest: 41 million
  13. Crash Bandicoot: 34 million
  14. Resident Evil: 31 million
  15. James Bond: 30 million
  16. Tomb Raider: 30 million
  17. Mega Man: 26 million
  18. Command & Conquer: 25 million
  19. Street Fighter: 25 million
  20. Mortal Kombat: 20 million
Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (20) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Tejstar #1 5 years ago

    I keep meaning to pick this up at somepoint...

  • spongebob #2 5 years ago

    Interestingly most of the succesful games are developed in Japan.

  • Rodriguez #3 5 years ago

    Interesting little list, looks like Super Mario Galaxy might push Mario over the 200 million sold mark (edit: if most Wii owners pick up a copy), very impressive!! I'm surprised a great franchise like Resident Evil isn't higher up the list though, absolutely loved No.4 and can't wait for 5!
    Well done Kingdom Hearts too, really enjoyed the first game but I still need to get round to playing the second!
    Edited by 1 at 07/02/07 @ 14:44

  • Scientist #4 5 years ago

    FIFA hasn't sold over 20 million units?

  • mkreku #5 5 years ago

    Finally a commercial success list that World of Warcraft doesn't top :D

  • AHiFi #6 5 years ago

    Halo should replace Mortal Kombat sometime next year though. And with Halo Wars also joining the line-up, it could be chasing Street Fighter.

  • dirigiblebill #7 5 years ago

    Just picked up Kingdom Hearts- wonder if I was the ten millionth ;)

    A truly great game this, albeit plagued with a horrendous camera. I never suspected Donald Duck could kick so much arse.

  • CitizenGeek #8 5 years ago

    Kingdom Hearts is brilliant and here's to another ten million copies! It's also great to see Final Fantasy so hugh up on the chart as is generally considered a hardcore series and isn't as all-audiences friendly as Mario or Pokémon or other games on that list.

  • ArcMonkey #9 5 years ago

    But where's Halo? Warcraft?

  • MasterGrief #10 5 years ago

    LOL theres no way Halo is overtaking MK. I mean Halo 1 + 2 combined sold just over 10 million units so Halo 3 would need to sell 10 million to even equal MK. Highly unlikely considering the 360's installed base

    On a side note how the heck did Lineage selll that many ? It's a MMORPG SO 43 million seems far fetched

  • rhinoxious #11 5 years ago

    Tetris?

    I'm a bit dubious about this list.

  • rhinoxious #12 5 years ago

    Ok the whole list has been simply ripped from this wiki:

    [link url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_b est-selling_computer_and_video_games
    ]http://en .wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_bes...[/link]

    an easy piece of research by The Independent then!

    Tetris isn't included by the looks of it because it was bundled with the game boy, Then again Sonic 1 was bundled with the mega-drive for ages and I bet they're not discounting that.

  • rhinoxious #13 5 years ago

    "LOL theres no way Halo is overtaking MK. I mean Halo 1 + 2 combined sold just over 10 million units so Halo 3 would need to sell 10 million to even equal MK. Highly unlikely considering the 360's installed base "

    But the installed userbase could double over it's first big christmas. Though it's probably still a touch expensive for that at the moment plus the fact we don't have any obviously lame consoles in this 'generation' is a factor.

  • TheJanitor #14 5 years ago

    lineage 2 is a very good MMORPG. better than wow.

  • zendragon #15 5 years ago


    Indeed where is Tetris? A gazillion games on a gazillion platforms.

    Should have nş games.

    Doesn't take into account the price at witch the units are sold or expansion packs.

    Mario is just a name to many different kind of games, Mario Golf doesn't belong with mario 64!

    Obviously doesn't include bundles so...

  • dirigiblebill #16 5 years ago

    My high opinion of KH has slipped a bit after a prolonged encounter with the Gummi Ship. Quite how something so fundamentally shite found its way into something so classy is beyond me.

  • Scimarad #17 5 years ago

    Good!

    I'm glad some of you have got good taste in games...

  • Banksy #18 5 years ago

    Rob doesn't agree with Tom's take on the word "franchise", then?

  • AOFanboi #19 5 years ago

    I got "stuck" in KH1 because the dancing camera made me miss the Hercules-world trial to progress on that world. Am waiting for the sequel (apparently with a better camera) to drop in price before I buy it; I have gotten burned one too many times buying a full-price title only to watch it hit Platinum a month later.

  • Daikon #20 5 years ago

    Kind of to be expected of a franchise that's basically Final Fantasy and Disney thrown together, isn't it?
    Edited by 1 at 09/02/07 @ 05:05