Japan's Most Wanted Game Isn't GTA 6. It's Pokemon.

"599 votes." That's the number Pokemon Winds and Waves pulled on Famitsu's latest most wanted games chart, based on reader votes cast between April 1 and April 7. Grand Theft Auto 6, the game that has dominated Western anticipation for years, managed 148. Not second place. Not fifth. Eleventh.

According to the chart published by Nintendo Everything, Pokemon Winds and Waves held the #1 spot for a second consecutive week, with Capcom's Pragmata trailing in second at 541 votes on PS5. Between those two games and GTA 6 at #11 sit Ganbare Goemon Daishuugo, Persona 4 Revival, Splatoon Raiders, Rhythm Heaven Groove, Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave, Yoshi and the Mysterious Book, Professor Layton and the New World of Steam, and Onimusha: Way of the Sword. Every single one of them a Japanese-developed title. GTA 6 didn't just lose to Pokemon; it lost to nearly every major domestic release on the board.

I find this fascinating, not because GTA 6 is somehow a bad game or an undeserved hit, but because it lays bare how differently Japanese players prioritize their anticipation compared to the global conversation. Western social media treats Rockstar's next open-world crime epic like the second coming. In Japan, it's behind a new Goemon game. Behind Rhythm Heaven. Behind a Yoshi platformer. The cultural gap isn't subtle; it's a canyon.

The Switch 2 Effect

What jumps out from the full top 30 is how thoroughly Nintendo's next console dominates the list. Pokemon Winds and Waves, Splatoon Raiders, Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave, Yoshi and the Mysterious Book, and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth are all Switch 2 titles. Even Pragmata appears twice, once for PS5 at #2 and again for Switch 2 at #13. Japanese players aren't just excited about specific games; they're excited about Nintendo's new hardware in a way that PS5 exclusives and multiplatform blockbusters can't match. Pokemon Winds and Waves is set to hit Switch 2 in 2027, and it's already running away with the poll despite being over a year out.

Pragmata's strong showing is interesting in its own right. I wrote last week about how the game is tracking close to Resident Evil 4 Remake numbers for Capcom, and seeing it hold #2 in Japan on PS5 while also cracking the top 15 on Switch 2 reinforces just how much momentum that title has built. Capcom is having a moment.

The bottom half of the chart tells its own story. Neptunia Unlimited debuted at #27 on PS5 and #29 on Switch, while niche picks like Culdcept Begins, Utawarerumono, and Kyoto Xanadu all placed. Famitsu's readership has always leaned toward RPGs and domestic franchises, and this chart is a reminder that the audience voting here is self-selecting. But even accounting for that, GTA 6 pulling fewer votes than a Professor Layton game says something real about where Japanese enthusiasm lies.

GTA 6 will almost certainly be a commercial monster worldwide. Rockstar doesn't need to win a Famitsu poll to move tens of millions of copies. But if you've spent the last two years assuming the entire industry revolves around one game, this chart is a useful corrective. In Japan, the most anticipated game is a Pokemon title on hardware that isn't even out yet, and it's not particularly close.