Most people didn’t think it would do this well
When I visited Japan several months after its release and played Pokken Tournament in multiple locations, I didn’t really see any major activity.
Most fighting game fans were playing Street Fighter and Guilty Gear, and while the multi-cabinet setups (at least 10 per floor) were full, the dual Pokken systems were often deserted. So when I heard the news that Pokken shipped over one million copies on Wii U as of today, I was pretty ecstatic that it found an audience on consoles.
It could stand to have a little more content and a more varied campaign, but as a fighting game, it has the fundamentals. The good news is that despite the fact that Bandai Namco was hesitant to commit to DLC, it has since changed its tune, starting with the addition of Darkrai. It has also been updating it frequently, patching out infinite combos and bugs, so kudos to the development team for the success.
News Release [Bandai Namco via Gematsu]
