So I accidentally ran into
@SegaNintendoUbisoft 's Twitter while browsing Twitter and decided to browse it.
I ran into a particular tweet with some pretty big news through this that I am surprised nobody is talking about. I've compiled the relevant info into this post.
Sonic the Hedgehog has surpassed Super Mario and Pokémon in total combined sales, meaning it is now the best selling video game series of all time.
http://www.segasammy.co.jp/english/ir/library/pdf/printing_annual/2015/all_ar2015_e.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_game_franchises
NOTE: "Super Mario" consists only of the core Mario series, being stuff like the classic 2D platformers, the New Super Mario Bros games, and the 3D platformers like Super Mario 64. "Mario" is anything with the Mario name on it, and that still beats Sonic's total sales by quite a bit (mainly thanks to the phenomenal sales of Mario Kart), but this is still a really impressive feat and I never even expected Sonic to surpass Pokémon's sales in the modern era, let alone Super Mario.
In all cases, these sales include physical units, digital downloads, and even expansion packs.
Super Mario Bros. first released on the NES on September 13th, 1985.
Sonic the Hedgehog first released on June 23rd, 1991.
By the time the first Sonic the Hedgehog had released, Super Mario World was the latest Super Mario game released, being the 6th game in the franchise.
Pokémon's numbers are as of
February 29th, 2016.
Super Mario's official total sales numbers are as of
September 2015, however, the Wikipedia listing is also accounting for the confirmed 1.46 million units sold of Super Mario Maker as of December 2016.
Since December, Pokémon has only had Pokkén and VC ports.
Super Mario has only had a Super Mario World VC port on the New 3DS.
Sonic has only had Mario & Sonic at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games (3DS) and SEGA 3D Classics Collection. Most of what Sonic released in 2015 was Free to Play titles, which do not factor into the sales number, nor do their microtransactions, meaning Sonic just had an almost completely blank year sales wise.
Mario & Sonic Olympics factor into "Mario" and Sonic the Hedgehog sales, but not "Super Mario" sales.