Pokémon series has sold over 279m units worldwide

The blockbuster Pokmon series has sold over 279 million units globally since it debuted in Japan 20 years ago.

This impressive figure comes by way of a press release from The Pokmon Company (translated by NeoGAF’s JoeM86– thank you), which claims that the pocket monster series has hit that sales milestone as of February 29th 2016.

That number includes all Pokmon games, including spin-off titles like the Mystery Dungeon sub-series. If we’re talking just the mainline series, that has sold 201 million units.

That figure includes Virtual Console sales for Pokmon Red, Green, Blue and Yellow for 3DS, which were released to celebrate the franchise’s 20th anniversary.

Just last month, The Pokmon Company confirmed the next entry in the series would be Pokmon Sun and Moon, which would be hitting shelves at the end of this year.