Yo-Kai Watch was a semi-popular series of monster-catching RPGs released throughout the mid-2010s. Despite what that may imply, no, the Yo-Kai Watch games were not attempting to copy Pokémon or imitate its success. The two franchises were entirely independent from one another and featured drastically different gameplay loops and approaches to storytelling.
That said, does anyone remember “Yo-Kai Watch,” or is that just me? The first game alone sold nearly three million copies worldwide— not bad for the debut of a game series on a console that was nearly five years old at the time of its release. The second game, “Yo-Kai Watch 2,” sold over seven million units across three versions worldwide. On top of that, the anime and manga, which had both been ongoing since the first game’s release, were greatly expanded.
On certain “Yo-Kai Watch”-related products, QR codes were printed that could be scanned in-game to unlock new questlines, enemies to befriend and special items. Thankfully, the vast majority of these codes have been preserved and documented, allowing anyone who wants to experience this add-on content the ability to do so, provided their game is updated to the latest version. However, there are a few promotional items and Yo-Kai that have been seemingly lost to time.
For “Yo-Kai Watch 2,” “Yo-Kai Watch 3,” and a spin-off title, “Yo-Kai Watch Blasters,” bonus Yo-Kai were given to users who had purchased a copy of any game digitally. These Yo-Kai could only be obtained from this digital-download bonus, either by a player who purchased the copy themself or traded the Yo-Kai from someone who had. While an issue of preservation on its own, most of these Yo-Kai also ended up being extremely useful for competitive teams, as they were some of the best Yo-Kai in the game, leading to several players who had purchased the game physically to feel priced out of the competition.
This problem was made even worse with the shutdown of the Nintendo eShop in 2024, essentially making it so that the number of these digitally exclusive Yo-Kai became finite. This would have potentially spelled the end of the game’s competitive scene had it not been for the fact that there were plenty of other teams that Yo-Kai players could use to remain competitive. Nonetheless, it is still a scary thought. Imagine a Speed-Boost-Blaziken scenario all over again: entire teams being swept with no possible counter simply because a player failed to buy a copy of a 3DS title several years ago.
A fun fact about the second game’s standalone content expansion, titled “Yo-Kai Watch 2: Psychic Specters,” is that the game was developed alongside the production of the anime’s second season. This means that it was filled with all sorts of storyline references, questline tie-ins and special locations the player could visit that also appeared in the show. While all this content can be experienced in the game just fine, the anime it is referencing is in danger of being considered lost media.
As a result, much of the gameplay and written dialogue about the anime-inspired content can feel confusing to new players. Sometimes, it really does just come out of nowhere, and the game fully expects that players have at least heard about some of the show’s plot points before. Characters like Directator, Kyubi, Komasan and Noko show up randomly and then are never seen again. To fans of the anime, this is simply seen as fan service, but to players who have never watched the show, it can feel a bit jarring when these characters attempt to reference something from the show that never occurred in the mainline games. These occurrences are limited to sidequests and the post-game, though, so it is not a huge issue that affects regular gameplay all too much.
The anime, however, is in a bit of a tight spot right now. After the show’s streaming contract with Netflix expired during the pandemic, it was briefly added to HBO Max’s catalog for a year and a half before being removed a second time. Now, the only way to legally watch the anime is to buy each episode piecemeal at full price on either the Amazon Prime Video, Google Play, or Apple TV storefronts. It is worth noting that buying all three seasons of the show this way would cost over $90 and, considering the show’s hit-or-miss record of maintaining contracts and streaming companies pulling purchased content associated with them from users’ purchased libraries once they expire, this does not seem like a long-lasting way to preserve the anime.
On top of that, the third game, which was the last to be localized outside of Japan, sold very poorly. So poorly in fact, that no party involved with the game released any concrete sales statistics, unverified figures put the numbers of copies sold in America at around 50,000. Following the commercial failure of Yo-Kai Watch 3, all plans to release any further games outside of Japan were seemingly canceled, including the fourth game, whose cancellation came at a time when its localization was reportedly well underway.
A reimagining of Yo-Kai Watch, titled Holy Horror Mansion, was announced late last year. However, the game seems to have very little in common with its source material, much of Yo-Kai Watch’s original art direction, character designs, and feel looks to have been sanitized to accommodate a less anime and folklore-inspired aesthetic, instead positioning the still-unnamed befriendable creatures in the game more as Pokemon than Yo-Kai with their own distinct personalities, voices, and mannerisms. The title also found itself embroiled in controversy after it was discovered that generative A.I was used to some of the trailer’s assets, angering fans across the board, many now even say that they are outright boycotting the game because of the usage of artificial intelligence. Regardless of one’s stance on the boycott, it sets a worrying precedent for the path the Yo-Kai Watch franchise is going down, arguably one risking its complete extinction.
