If you’re an avid gamer, racking up hundreds of hours in a video game is commonplace. If you aren’t, video game sales numbers and time played statistics can be jarring to see. After the responsibilities of everyday life are done and dusted, many of us turn to our favorite games to unwind and transport ourselves into a different reality. Hours pass by, and we rack up achievement after achievement, with these cherished moments sometimes shared with fellow gamers around the world.
Video games often go beyond being a form of entertainment – they have the potential to become infused into pop culture and cultural phenomena, even shaping entire narratives in our world. Throughout the past few decades, we’ve seen a list of standout titles dominate in sales, and we’ll be going through a couple of them right here.
Minecraft
Minecraft has risen, peaked, fallen, and effectively revived itself over its lifespan, and it remains the best-selling video game ever, with over 300 million sales. It popularized the sandbox-style video game, encouraging free play, creativity, and personalized goal setting, which aligned with the types of titles that were becoming widespread in the gaming community.
While the game doesn’t have an inherent goal, Minecraft is all about exploring a 3D world, gathering raw materials, crafting items, building structures, and even competing with other players or fighting hostile enemies. Since the world is procedurally generated, the gameplay stays fresh, providing brand-new adventures with diverse happenings and possibilities.
Grand Theft Auto V
We’ve finally been blessed with a release date and impressive trailer for Grand Theft Auto VI, but while we wait patiently (what’s another year after waiting 11?), it seems like plenty of people are still hooked on GTA V. Despite it being a relatively old game, it continues to sell around a staggering five million copies every three months. This alone indicates its enduring popularity.
Its main story centers around three primary characters – gangster Franklin Clinton, bank robber Michael De Santa, and drug and arms dealer Trevor Phillips – who undergo their own storylines and commit heists and go on missions together throughout the course of the game. While there is a story, players can freely explore the open world and encounter all sorts of side missions and spontaneous events.
Pac-Man
With approximately 42 million sales to date, Pac-Man has retained a position in the top 20 best-selling video game titles of all time. It was a simple game developed specifically for arcades in 1980, where players controlled a round yellow character to eat all the pellets in a maze while avoiding four different-colored ghosts.
Many games at the time were limited in themes, so this cutesy, colorful, and uncomplicated one appealed to a much wider audience. Pac-Man’s commercial success led to various spin-offs and releases on multiple consoles. It was highly influential, establishing the maze chase genre, the concept of power-ups, AI that responds to player actions, and broader audience appeal.
Tetris
Tetris, released in the same era as Pac-Man, also became one of the greatest video games ever to exist. Published on over 65 platforms, it is arguably the most successful puzzle game in the world.
The premise of Tetris is also super simple, given that it was developed during a time when gaming was all about simplistic yet addictive concepts (we seem to have returned to that ethos in some way with mobile gaming). Players rotate and arrange falling blocks that spawn at the top of the screen and look to create horizontal rows of blocks to clear them from the stack. As Tetris features elements of critical thinking and challenge, it eventually became popular for competitive play.
Mario Kart 8
Among the list of top 50 best-selling video games of all time, over half of them are made by none other than multinational company Nintendo. The company has historically seen success after success, releasing major internationally renowned franchises, such as Mario, The Legend of Zelda, and Animal Crossing. Mario, however, has always been Nintendo’s bread and butter, with countless spin-offs, such as Mario Kart 8.
It might seem hard to believe, but this racing game has actually become even more popular than titles that use the original side-scrolling format. At this point, it stands out as not just one of the most played games in history, but also a cultural icon.
Pokémon
There are 122 Pokémon games in this famous Japanese media franchise, but it’s Pokémon Red, Pokémon Green, Pokémon Blue, and Pokémon Yellow that take the crown – the first-ever installments of the series. Before we look into their popularity, we should address the fact that Pokémon is not only a giant in the video game industry but also one of the highest-grossing media franchises ever. There are trading cards, merchandise, and a recently ended 26-year anime series with 25 seasons. It’s a beloved universe adored by children as well as adults for its endearing nostalgia.
The franchise is a portmanteau of Pocket Monsters, as the game’s concept hinges on the collection of animal-like creatures. The player character assumes the role of a Pokémon Trainer, who explores the world around them, catches Pokémon species and evolves them, and trains and engages them in battles. The battles and NPC interactions are tons of fun alone, but the individual supporting narratives provide incredible depth to the games.
