Marathon Lands Fourth In March U.S. Sales Charts

Marathon, the continuously updated multiplayer shooter from Bungie, finished fourth in Circana’s U.S. sales charts for March. That puts it behind MLB The Show 26, Resident Evil Requiem, and WWE 2K26 in a month packed with major releases, which is a strong showing for a launch-month game in a crowded market.

Circana’s March report, shared by senior analyst Mat Piscatella, also shows how much was moving around it. Marathon’s placement matters because players and publishers alike still watch these charts as a rough read on whether a new shooter has real traction, and Bungie clearly needed a solid result after some fans got spooked by player numbers.

About Marathon

Circana’s report frames Marathon as a launch-month release in March, and the game sits in the shooter genre. Bungie’s title lives in a tough spot: it has to hold attention as a continuously updated multiplayer shooter while competing with games that arrive with a cleaner marketing story or a more obvious single-player hook. That makes a top-four finish more than a vanity metric; it suggests there’s enough interest to keep people checking in.

The source also says people genuinely seem to be enjoying Marathon, even if some fans crashed out a bit over player numbers. That split matters for a live-service-style game, because first impressions can turn sour fast when communities start reading too much into early activity. Bungie now has to keep existing players engaged and convince the shrugging crowd to give it another look.

Circana’s March U.S. Sales Chart

Mat Piscatella said MLB The Show 26 took the top spot in Circana’s published U.S. sales charts for March, leading in dollar sales. Resident Evil Requiem followed at No. 2, after debuting at No. 1 in February, and Piscatella noted that it is now the fifth best-selling Resident Evil game ever, behind Resident Evil 5, the remake of Resident Evil 4, Resident Evil Village, and the original Resident Evil 4. WWE 2K26 landed third, and Marathon came in fourth.

• MLB The Show 26 was No. 1 in March.
• Resident Evil Requiem was No. 2 in March and No. 1 in February.
• WWE 2K26 was No. 3 in March.
• Marathon was No. 4 in March.

That order tells a simple story: March belonged to recognizable sports and blockbuster brands, and Marathon still managed to break into the top tier. For Bungie, that’s the useful part. It means the game didn’t need to win the month to look healthy, and in a release window this busy, that’s a decent result for a new shooter trying to find its audience.

Piscatella also pointed out that Pokémon Pokopia may have been quietly lapped by Marathon and the other top games, because Nintendo does not share digital sales numbers with Circana. In other words, the chart may not show the full picture for every release, and Pokopia could sit much higher than the public ranking suggests. That caveat matters, because a missing digital slice can make a chart look more definitive than it really is.

Other Games Moving Around the Chart

Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection landed at No. 7 in the U.S., while Crimson Desert debuted at No. 15. Piscatella said Pearl Abyss is not sharing its digital sales numbers with Circana, which means the chart may leave out a meaningful chunk of Crimson Desert’s business. He also said Crimson Desert, MLB The Show 26, and Pokémon Pokopia led Circana’s projected full game spending, so the sales rank alone does not tell the whole story.

• Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection was No. 7.
• Crimson Desert debuted at No. 15.
• Crimson Desert, MLB The Show 26, and Pokémon Pokopia led projected full game spending.

Death Stranding 2: On the Beach made one of the biggest jumps in the report, climbing from No. 165 to No. 17 thanks to its PC release in March. Piscatella said the PC version accounted for 85 percent of full game dollar sales that month, which shows how much a platform launch can reshape a title’s commercial profile almost overnight. Mario Kart World also rose sharply after Nintendo Switch 2 Mario Kart World bundles began to run out of stock, pushing more people toward the standalone game.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019) also had a strong March on PC, helped by a 90-percent-off Steam sale that dropped it to $5.99 for a bit. That kind of discount can still move old stock fast, which is exactly why publishers keep leaning on bargain-bin pricing when they want one more spike. Meanwhile, Circana said game-content spending rose 8 percent year-over-year to $4.6 billion, and hardware spending climbed 69 percent year-over-year to $500 million, mostly because of the Nintendo Switch 2.

What This Means for Players

For Marathon players, the headline is straightforward: the game is not disappearing into the noise. A fourth-place finish in March gives Bungie breathing room, and the report suggests the studio has at least one thing going for it beyond launch-week curiosity. People seem to be enjoying it, and that matters more than a noisy debate about player counts that can spiral into panic before a game has had time to settle.

Still, the concern around Marathon is real. The source describes it as sitting at a strange crossroads for Bungie, and that feels accurate for a continuously updated multiplayer shooter arriving in a market that has been openly hostile to several of those lately. If Bungie wants this to stick, it needs to keep the updates coming and make sure the game earns repeat logins instead of just a brief burst of launch-month attention.

Next month’s Circana report should show whether Marathon’s launch-month momentum holds or slips once the first wave of attention fades. If Bungie keeps making the case for the game with steady updates, the numbers may look even better by the time April’s charts land.