Anime more powerful than ever as Persona 3 Reload becomes the fastest selling game in Atlus' history

Makoto Yuki and his persona from Persona 3 Reload.

(Image credit: Atlus)

People are very eager to conquer a couple hundred floors of Tartarus. At least, that's what the sales figures for Persona 3 Reload suggest. Atlus announced earlier today that its gussied-up remake of the first modern-style Persona game has sold 1,000,000 copies across the world since its release on February 2, making it the fastest selling game in the company's history. It's all down to Koromaru, if you ask me.

Persona 3 Reload sold 1,000,000 copies worldwide within its first week, becoming the fastest selling game in ATLUS history! 🎉A huge thank you to our community for your incredible support! We look forward to breaking more records with you. 💙 pic.twitter.com/C2abDAwCDsFebruary 8, 2024

For reference, Atlus announced back in 2021—marking Persona's 25th anniversary—that the series had then sold a total of 15 million copies across all its versions during its lifetime. For a single entry in the series to do in one week a fifteenth of what every other game did in 25 years is, well, pretty impressive, if you ask me.

Atlus is clearly riding a couple of waves here. First and foremost is the game's simultaneous worldwide release. Persona has been a strictly PlayStation series for ages, with Atlus stubbornly refusing to accept that people on other platforms also wanted to be magical Japanese teens. It's been PS-only for so long, in fact, that I'm still a bit taken aback whenever I scroll through my Steam library and see Persona 3 Portable, 4 Golden, and 5 Royal all lined up as if it isn't a violation of the basic order of the universe. That P3R is hitting PC, Xbox, and PlayStation all at the same time can't help but juice the numbers.

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But despite the games being locked up on PlayStation island for so long, they've been building more and more momentum with every release. Persona 3—the original one—established the series' current model, Persona 4 gathered more fans for the cause, and it really feels like Persona 5 finally pushed the games over into something resembling mainstream popularity.

That momentum only built as those games came to non-PlayStation platforms in dribs and drabs over the last few years, and now it feels like Atlus is cashing in its accumulated chips with P3R's stonking performance.

I'm eager to play it. Heather Newman scored the game 89% in our Persona 3 Reload review, calling it "fabulous, engrossing, and ridiculously deep." By all accounts, it sounds like it's earned those sales.

One of Josh's first memories is of playing Quake 2 on the family computer when he was much too young to be doing that, and he's been irreparably game-brained ever since. His writing has been featured in Vice, Fanbyte, and the Financial Times. He'll play pretty much anything, and has written far too much on everything from visual novels to Assassin's Creed. His most profound loves are for CRPGs, immersive sims, and any game whose ambition outstrips its budget. He thinks you're all far too mean about Deus Ex: Invisible War.