In honor of the Pokemon franchise’s 20 year anniversary in February, Nintendo Co Ltd and The Pokemon Company re-released some of the earliest games in the series through the Nintendo 3DS Virtual Store, and it looks like that move has paid off, as the games have been downloaded over 1.5 million times so far.

The games sold include Pokemon Red and Green (the original dual-release games), Pokemon Blue (the Western version of Pokemon Green), and Pokemon Pikachu (also called Pokemon Yellow).

While both Nintendo and Pokemon are certainly popular in their native Japan, Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima noted in the company’s recent earnings report that a majority of these downloads came from the US.

“More than half of these downloads came from the American market,” Kimishima said. “Since the start of the calendar year, Pokémon has been the subject of much attention in America, and sales are showing a favorable trend.”

This might suggest that Pokemon nostalgia is more prominent in the US than in Japan, but Kimishima also pointed out that a large proportion of Japanese sales for the games came from codes purchased at retail stores rather than directly through the 3DS store.

Kimishima added, “We believe that we have successfully created a chance to appeal to the nostalgia of consumers who played these titles when they first came out.

The download figures for the Virtual Console games has certainly proven that Pokemon’s popularity hasn’t died, which is good news for the brand, as it will be releasing several new games in the coming year, including the mobile augmented reality game Pokemon GO, as well as the upcoming Pokemon Sun and Moon.

“I just mentioned that the Virtual Console Pokémon titles have been selling well, and excitement for Pokémon has been building, especially in North America, Nintendo’s largest market,” Kinishima said. “We aim to use this momentum to drive the launch of these new titles by making this one of our top priority titles for the fiscal year ending March 2017 and maximizing sales worldwide.”

Image courtesy of The Pokemon Company and Nintendo Co Ltd