The Top Ten Best-Selling Games For Wii U, 3DS, Wii And DS (As Of March 2020)

Love it, cheers Nintendo life. Still playing some of these gems and more besides.
I have 9 off the Wii U list.
3 off the Wii list.
1 off the 3DS list.
2 off the DS list.
Hmm something tells me I don't go for the best sellers.

Wind Waker HD needs a switch port. I have to imagine it would sell more like 8M copies at least

I own 3 on WiiU, 3 on 3DS, 6 on Wii and 5 on DS.

Still can't figure out why Nintendo refuses to make another Nintendogs. It's not for me but look at those sales.

Is it really fair to count Wii Sports?

Just hooked up my Wii U again after being put aside for the Switch. It's simply an amazing console, my kids love it. Sales numbers aside it was/is an incredible console. Don't forget it is a Wii as well, two great console in one.

@Shstrick agreed, wind waker HD would be a good fit for Switch. Perhaps have HD reworked versions of Phantom hour glass and Spirit tracks to go along with it.
Personally I want new games but I can see these selling well if they came to Switch.

Nintendogs for Switch please.

@RandomNerds I have Wii U, Xbox X and Switch connected to my TV, an have to say Wii U and Xbox both get way more play time than Switch at the moment.
Hoping that will change when/if certain games release.plenty to keep me busy until then.

Here's hoping Super Mario 3d World makes it in the rumored Mario Anniversary repeat later this year, or at least a port would be welcomed. Also, give us Wind Waker HD on the Switch. I would gladly pay full price again for another Zelda re-release.

I enjoy article like this because it's fun to look back at one of my favorite times in gaming.

I'm missing a couple of the Pokémon games but I have all the others. Yay me!

@Aaron09 Most of the top ten Wii U games were bundled with it at some point as well: Mario Kart 8, 3D World, Nintendo Land, Mario Bros U, Luigi U, and Mario Maker that I can recall.

Wii U is still the best console personally. Shame about the lack of advertising. Glad Nintendo decided to actually advertise the Switch. Unfortunately many of the best Switch games are just ports of Wii U games and only some have modest upgrades, while many more have been downgraded because they cant use the Wii U gamepad. I'm looking at you BotW, MK8, New Super Mario Brothers U.

I'm perfectly happy with my switch. But as I do most my gaming indoors, especially now, I prefer a system that is easier to switch media out, had more capabilities with the gamepad, and a more robust backlog of Nintendo classics. I believe the Wii U has every mainline Zelda game? I guess it won't have BotW 2, but unless there are some major graphical tweaks it could have.

@Aaron09 Yes, it was only bundled with the Wii for the first 3 months, before they began selling it separately

Wii U got me back into games - I loved it. I even went into it knowing it was a flop but I didn't care. I do like an underdog.

@RandomNerds
I agree. My Wii-U still gets plenty of play. Like you said, it plays all of the Wii and Wii-U library and I have probably over 200 Virtual Console games and Wiiware games that would keep me from ever selling it or putting it away.

Dear lord, not a single game that isn't published by Nintendo themselves.

I think I understand how something like this would hurt the ego of companies like Activision, Electronic Arts, Take-Two and Ubisoft.

@WiltonRoots Started out with my 3DS, but Wii U helped me take the deep dive back into gaming (Pikmin 3, baby!), and really get into Nintendo stuff. The console had problems, but I will defend the best games on that console to the bitter end-especially Splatoon!

I'm hoping Switch gets a new Nintendogs and more Mii-centric games, specifically something like Tomodachii life (and hopefully Miitopia). Those were unexpectedly popular, and I'm surprised Nintendo hasn't tried to bring them back. Nintendogs with Joy-Con motion controls sounds like a blast.

Also, it's funny how Mario Kart actually manages to outsell mainline Mario games. That series is absolutely insane.

@Shstrick Wind Waker selling 8 million on switch?

It sold 3 million copies on Game Cube
It barely sold 2 million copies on Wii U

Wind waker only sells to Nintendo fanboys

Face the facts, dude.

This proves that 2D Mario sells Hardware even more than 3D Mario.

And yet Nintendo doesn't care.

And no, Super Mario Maker is not a proper 2D Mario. It's a building game. A toy.

Knock it off.

These lists are often... frustrating. Nintendo is my very favorite company, and they make all of my favorite series. However these lists always have my least favorite games dominating them. Pokemon and Smash, in the DS/Wii era it was so many “casual” games.

I know these games are what keep the company afloat and able to do other things. It’s just boring I guess. I wish the series I like sold as well.

All excellent systems in their own way. I own all except the normal Wii, which is no problem at all until I need access to GCN games.

@DK-Fan GameCube and Wii U combined total sales were 35m. Wind Waker and HD combined total sales were 7m. 20% of GameCube and Wii U owners bought Wind Waker. Switch has sold 55m units. 20% of 55m is 11m. So 20m switch owners didn’t buy Wind Waker before and a lot would probably double-dip. Assuming ~ the same percentage of people want WW on Switch as wanted the original/Wii u version, 8m isn’t that much of a stretch. I’m with you on 2D Mario, though. 2D Mario all the way

Plugged my Wii U back in for the first time since the Switch launch today... Gonna run through some old Mario games with my kids. Gonna play Mario Galaxy, Galaxy 2, Mario 64, Paper Mario 64, NSMB Wii... I'm calling it history class, and it's part of my home schooling curriculum.

The Wii U list reminded me that while I have NSMBU + NSLU, I have yet to obtain NSMBU and NSLU in their standalone formats. Once I get them and Sing Party I believe I will own every Nintendo-published PAL release on the system.

Not sure if I have Tomodachi Life. I have all the Wii U and WIi games. Myself or my son have all the 3DS and DS games, with the possible exception noted above.

@Shstrick "Wind Waker and HD combined total sales were 7m."

2M + 3M =7M.....

Looks like Math and Logic left the building...

@DK-Fan Gamecube Wind Waker sold a lot more than 3 million copies, so nah. https://vgsales.fandom.com/wiki/The_Legend_of_Zelda

Wish Nintendo would put even a tiny effort into releasing updates after they are submitted. Wonder what the real top selling games would be if they weren't internally playing "favorites" all the time and give all their games equal treatment they deserve

@mesome713 Ugh, no. Just no.

Mario kart has always been my favourite Nintendo series. I love how relaxing it is to play and how much fun it is to race against friends!

I own 9 out of the 10 for Wii U (all except Mario Party 10),

10 out of 10 for the Wii (I'm sure I would even have all games if this was a Top 30),

and 7 out of 10 for the DS (bought all of them except the 3 Pokémon games because the main Pokémon games are the most overrated and boring Nintendo games imo. I like most of the spin-offs though)

I never bought a game for my 3DS and 3DS XL. I found a copy of Super Mario 3D Land on a bus stop, so it's 1 out of 10.

Nintendo Land, Yoshi's Crafted World, and the clay Kirby game are the only major Wii U releases I really have left to get I think.

Mainly because I'm not too keen on touching Star Fox Zero.

Lets face it. Nintendo wont re-release all those games in the Switch even if they sold well. Why? Simple, Nintendo has learned that that when launching a console it needs tons of games, and going throgh the back catalog makes it easier than developing games from scratch. Since the Wii U sold poorly, they could still re-realease most of those games on the Switch because many people had not played them yet. However since the switch has sold so much it would not make to much since to re release Switch games in their next gen console. Only a small percentage of people would double dip. Therefore, some old gems have their re releases reserved for their next gen console.

Our Wii U console still gets regular use as my kids still play Nintendo Land, Mario Kart 8, and Super Mario 3D World on it along with one of them trying to play Breath of the Wild.

It's a shame that console died an early death because it really is fun to play on.

If the DS list is counting Virtual Console sales, I'd take a hack at guessing why it sold so well. A real entrypoint to getting the most out of your Nintendo hardware...

Wii: 6/10
U: 6/10
Niiiiice