Last Tuesday, Nintendo released their quarterly financial report. Therefore, I thought it might be fun to visualise what Nintendo-published games have sold the best on the Nintendo Switch. Using the list of best-selling Switch Games on [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Nintendo_Switch_video_games), I created some graphs to show just how well Nintendo is doing. First, here is a graph comparing how each of Nintendo’s franchises have sold.
[Best selling franchises on Switch](https://preview.redd.it/eqhy0znd30ic1.png?width=1301&format=png&auto=webp&s=fc8553d81d0e0476c4a019edfb4c4b2c513431a5)
Something that is noticeble immediately is that when you combine all games from the Mario Franchise (Platformers, Kart, Party, Sports, etc.), this towers over every other Nintendo Franchise. The amount of Mario games sold on Switch is over double of the amount of Pokemon games sold. When we break down the Mario Franchise further, we get this graph:
[Mario Game Sales on Nintendo Switch](https://preview.redd.it/ohosq4yi50ic1.png?width=1300&format=png&auto=webp&s=ed88fb475589641e259cae1d864c32fc6951df8b)
We can clearly see that Mario Kart is bigger than both 3D and 2D Mario at this point. This is even more impressive when you consider that most of the Mario Kart sales on Switch comes from one single game, which was also a Wii U port. Compared that with 3D Mario, which has had 3 releases on Switch (Odyssey, 3D All-Stars and 3D World+Bowser’s Fury) and you can see just how popular Mario is.
Next let’s look at the other major Nintendo mainstay, Zelda:
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[Zelda Games on Nintendo Switch](https://preview.redd.it/oirmw3aw60ic1.png?width=1295&format=png&auto=webp&s=11cf99dafea49fea38c36c56f0f8ded81614d1b7)
Compared to Mario, Zelda’s sales may seem small at a first glance. But is is really impressive what Zelda’s Open-World entries has achieved for Zelda. If we just count Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom towards Zelda’s sales, it is still easily Nintendo’s third biggest franchise. The lack of a new 2D Zelda on the console looks like a major missed opportunity for Nintendo, as the Link’s Awakening, a full-price remake of a 30-year old GameBoy game, managed to sell over 6 million copies.
I would also like to take a look at some of Nintendo’s smaller franchises. Pikmin, Xenoblade, Fire Emblem and Metroid have all recieved a lot of support from the Big N on the Switch, so let’s take a look at if that effort has paid off.
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[Smaller franchises sales on the Switch](https://preview.redd.it/0pmpxe1680ic1.png?width=1302&format=png&auto=webp&s=40c6673b81c67ec494aa1c36a19c99c726e1f2af)
All of these franchises are doing solid numbers, with the real standout being Fire Emblem: Three Houses’ over 4 million sales. All mainline releases from these franchises did pass over 1 million copies sold, and each franchise recieved their best-selling title on the Switch. In short, the future of each of these franchises is looking bright.
Let’s also take a look at Pokemon:
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[Pokemon Sales on Switch](https://preview.redd.it/uxguj8wx90ic1.png?width=1292&format=png&auto=webp&s=d325bd3e1954b7f50e243163b269af5889cb622a)
The franchise has been constantly met with criticism during the Switch era, but the sales show no sign of slowing down anytime soon. Pokemon Scarlet and Violet are on their way to become the best-selling Pokemon Games on Switch.
Lastly, let’s take a look at the top 20 best-selling Switch Games:
https://preview.redd.it/6vfvn3m4b0ic1.png?width=1292&format=png&auto=webp&s=e940864a6b5a7c7824d821b39f5472d5d607705f
As you can see, no matter what franchise, Nintendo is doing really well. I hope you liked this post, I wanted to visualize their sales in a way that’s more fun than their financial reports so I hope this gave you some more insight. 🙂
Things to note:
1. Only titles which have sold over 1 million copies and was published by Nintendo in at least one region are included. Nintendo doesn’t release data for titles that have sold below 1 million.
2. Some of the titles included haven’t had their sales updated since December 2022. We know that these titles haven’t sold 1 million copies between April-December 2023, but the real number of copies sold is certainly bigger than the current number.
by FoxGuard
28 Comments
Great post! Very cool, thanks!
This is awesome! I love graphs and Nintendo so this is super fun to look at!
Pokémon is pretty much shovelware at this point. Shocking that people continue to buy into it.
I guess it’s a toxic mix of childhood nostalgia and addiction.
I know how many copies Mario Kart sells and it’s still shocking for me every time I see it. Why, just why.
Go Pokemon!
Animal Crossing isn’t doing badly given that it’s one game compared to Zelda’s four…
Zelda is shockingly low, also as a metroid fan i dislike this graph
Pikmin 4 outsold XC2 and Metroid Dread? Wow, and in such a short amount of time.
This is really interesting but it’s almost cheating to combine Mario platformers and Mario Kart. Yes I know they’re both Mario but MK is basically a brand in its own right at this point.
I wonder what the chart would look like of Mario and MK were split up?
This is well collated and interesting info – thanks for pulling it together.
As a data person, I’m twitching a little at some of the labelling though.
Good post, but I think it would be great to add a study of how much software originally developed for the Wii U contributed to total software sales.
Pikmin 4 surpassing Pikmin 3 gives me hope for a 5th, even if it takes more than 6 years.
Kind of insane that Animal Crossing is the 4th highest selling with just one game. Obviously people love Animal Crossing, but I think the game coming out during the pandemic helped it a lot as well
Which makes it even more surprising how quickly Nintendo stopped supporting the game
It’s also nice to see basically every franchise hitting record sales for their franchise on Switch
Metroid is doing better than I thought
It’s actually wild how well Animal Crossing did, surprised Nintendo didn’t support it more.
Actually not surprised cause Nintendo but still lol.
It sad that the only good Pokemon games on Switch, the spin-offs, are the worst selling.
Thats really impressive work, thanks
That’s why they don’t give a damn about Metroid.
that they still underdelivered with Mario Party despite how much it sells is crazy
I know Animal Crossing: New Horizons hit a huge spike because of quarantine, but it still surprises me it’s bigger than Smash Bros.
Well, coolest post in a while. Thank you!
Is there data for 3rd party games on switch. I wonder how well they are selling compared to nin franchises.
This was cool. Thank you
I’m really happy with how both the Fire Emblem franchise and the Nintendo Warriors spinoffs are doing, of course they could always do better, but as long as the numbers guarantee future entries I’m glad.
Hopefully Zelda will eventually get more 2D new games or remakes (I really hope the Oracles remakes/remasters rumors are true) as well as spinoffs like the cadence of Hyrule or the Warriors.
My take away is that game freak puts minimum amount of effort to maximize game sales. The numbers they are pulling for the low quality of games they put out is crazy. Holy shit Sword/Shield and Scarlet/Violets numbers are nuts for how poorly made those games are. Criticisms means absolutely nothing with those number of units sold.
Fire Emblem Three Houses really was a breath of fresh air. It was my first fire emblem game, and several years later I’m still wishing for more.
My favorite fact about game sales this gen: Ring Fit Adventure has outsold each of the games in the Gran Turismo series.
Fascinating. How did the re-released super mario world with bowser’s fury sell better than super mario wonder? Also metroid dread deserves more, that game was great