Zelda: Breath of the Wild must sell 2m copies to be profitable, report

Upcoming Wii U and NX The Legend of Zelda game Breath of the Wild has to sell more than 2m units in order to make back its development costs.

That’s according to a translation of Nintendo’s latest investor Q&A by Twitter user Cheesemeister3k, in which Shigeru Miyamoto is reported to have said that the forthcoming Zelda title must shift over 2m copies globally, and that it will be a hit if the game sells 300,000 copies in Japan alone.

Miyamoto also said that the game has 100 members of staff working on it, while 300 people are on the credits.

It was also noted by Miyamoto that what has been achieved in Breath of the Wild’s five-year development cycle will be useful for the next production, possibly hinting at a faster turnaround for the next Zelda game.

Meanwhile, the GM of Nintendo’s Entertainment Planning and Development Division Shinya Takahashi told investors that the company can make multiple ‘compact titles’ by using resources yielded from Breath of the Wild’s development. Takahashi said that Nintendo is trying to reduce development times by reusing game engines and other resources.

It was announced that the new Zelda title was called Breath of the Wild at E3 2016. The game is launching simultaneously for Wii U and NX, pointing to a March 2017 release window.