With Nintendo having shared its financial reports for Q3, therefore covering the first nine months of the financial year, we can get an idea of the year's notable successes, especially as these sales figures cover the all-important Holiday period.
Overall Nintendo can point to nine of its games that have sold over one million copies worldwide between 1st April and 31st December 2015. Five are on 3DS and four on Wii U, and unsurprisingly there are some fresh releases alongside some old stagers.
Let's break it down - bear in mind that Nintendo has evidently provided heavily rounded estimates, based on some discrepancies in the figures.
3DS Million Sellers
- Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer - 2.93 million sales (1.45 million in Japan, 1.48 million overseas)
- Pokemon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire - 1.52 million sales (180,000 in Japan, 1.34 million overseas) - lifetime sales of 11.46 million
- Mario Kart 7 - 1.33 million sales (160,000 in Japan, 1.17 million overseas) - lifetime sales of 13.03 million
- Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS - 1.16 million sales (150,000 in Japan, 1.01 million overseas) - lifetime sales of 7.92 million
- The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes - 1.08 million sales (190,000 in Japan, 900,000 overseas)
Wii U Million Sellers
- Splatoon - 4.06 million sales (1.37 million in Japan, 2.7 million overseas)
- Super Mario Maker - 3.34 million sales (880,000 in Japan, 2.46 million overseas)
- Mario Kart 8 - 2.13 million sales (210,000 in Japan, 1.91 million overseas) - lifetime sales of 7.24 million
- Yoshi's Woolly World - 1.31 million sales (130,000 in Japan, 1.19 million overseas)
We're a little surprised at just how evergreen some titles are, though the likes of Mario Kart 7 likely benefit from bundles, too. A pleasing inclusion is Yoshi's Woolly World, which has done well enough in the West to offset limited numbers in Japan. It's also notable that these numbers reflect the poor overall figures for 3DS software sales, with the top-selling games on the portable not matching the numbers of their highest-selling Wii U equivalents despite having a far larger install base.
As for Splatoon, well, we know how popular that is; it's been a significant success for Nintendo.
Let us know what you think of these results in the comments.
[source nintendo.co.jp]
Comments 58
There's also Mario Party 10 at 1.65M, but since that released one week before the fiscal year started (and didn't sell 1M during this fiscal year) it's not counted.
Splatoon has sold over 4 million copies? Nice, a new IP on a console owned by a little over 10 million people, very nice indeed. Waiting for a sequel on NX or whatever.
@Luffymcduck Almost at 13 million now.
So maybe last year wasn't such a bad year for Nintendo after all!
I'm surprised that Tri Force Heroes and other spinoffs sold that much overseas!
Why can't they reveal Fates in Japan alone though?
That's pretty impressive sales especially with Splatoon. Way to go, Nintendo! 👍👍👌
Happy for Splatoon, Nintendo made the right move on making that an Awesome video game, if it was not for Splatoon and Super Mario Maker, the Wii U would probably not be as strong as it is today! ok maybe not as big as Wii/GC. but still overall good for Wii U!
@Socar Fates has only sold 538k units, and they're trying to go with positive spin here by promoting games over a million.
@Socar Fates has sold just over 500,000 copies since its June release in Japan, which is not too bad for an arguably niche JRPG title (personally I consider Final Fantasy and Dragon's Quest to be the only non-niche JRPGs). I suspect sales to be significantly boosted with its western release, particularly in the States. It'll probably pass a million by then.
@Socar 0.5 million+ including the LE, probably. No digital, but I got a handle on the regular editions combined, which is 430k+ last time I saw it at Dengeki.
How come Woolly World did so exceptionally poorly in Japan? Do they hate Yoshi?
@FX102A Pokémon is a JRPG, and is anything but niche.
Pretty beastly tie-in ratios for Splatoon and Mario Kart 8.
Though some would say that these really are the games to own the system for in the first place.
So... Majora's Mask 3D didn't sell one million?
Check those lifetime Mario Kart 8 figures!
That's pretty brutal and makes me very happy, as the care that went into it deserves such recognition.
Also very happy to see Yoshi break a mill. The importance of aesthetics and feel should not be under-estimated, and both YWW and MK8 are evidence of that.
@DarkCoolEdge Not during the fiscal year that started in April 2015.
I hope Xenoblade Chronicles X eventually joins the list.
@FX102A How many sales does a game have to get before you don't consider it niche? Awakenings is estimated to have sold close to 2 million. And Fates should probably fare similarly after its Western release. Not quite the audience of Final Fantasy, but not shabby by any means. For me, niche means more like not close to a million
@amiiboacid It should. It will probably just take a few more months.
YOshi's Wooly world is a Superb , perfectly crafted and presented game. . .and os much fun to play in multiplayer co-op too!
@GameCube Touché; then again as true as that is I kinda feel it's evolved into arguably its own genre.
@roboshort Well these days it's seems like almost everything is "niche" unless it sells a minimum of 5 million. I knew Awakenings passed a million but not double that so sold better than expected. I still consider it borderline between niche and mainstream but I'll review.
Maybe "niche" was the wrong word to use.
Great news, all those games are absolutely stellar and deserve the high sales figures.
Yeah Splatoon! Also, where is Monter Hunter X? That game has sold like wildfire!!!
@amiiboacid Xenoblade X deserves much better sales. Should at least 2M right now if Nintendo wasn't so lazy with it.
Xenoblade Chronicles X did 115k in Japan so far, under 200k in North America and... we have no clue in Europe, but almost every title sells in Europe than it does in Japan. I don't think we'll ever be seeing this one on a million seller list, and surely nobody would have predicted that it would be, considering the sales of it's better reviewed predecessor on a much, MUCH better selling console.
Yay, Tri Force Heroes surpass 1 million. Great to see those 1 million+ sales games.
Surprise Smash Wii U isn't on the list, and wow Japan doesn't like Yoshi or Triforce heroes.
@LegendOfPokemon Don't forget that just like Majoras Mask Monster Hunter also released in the last fiscal period. Japan's fiscal period is April to March and not January to December. Most of this sales came in February '15 so that fell into the last period.
Oh and these are first party titles we are talking about not 3rd party. They wouldn't have Monster Hunter on that list. You won't see Yokai either.
Sorry didn't see that you said Monster Hunter X. For some reason I thought you were referring to MHU4. But the second paragraph will answer that part.
@Not-Another-Ad Smash U didn't sell 1 million during the current fiscal year.
@liljmoore Xenoblade X would sell 2M copies after being out in the West for less than 2 months? Why would it sell better and faster than both Splatoon and MK8?
Also @ThomasBW84, I don't think the 3ds and Wii U is a fair comparison in sales. Sure there's far more 3ds owners but there was a severe lack of quality 3ds games to choose from last year. I'm a huge Zelda fan and I chose to stay away from Tri Force Heroes like I'm sure a lot of Zelda fans did. The Wii U just had much better first party games to choose from.
@jariw I'm a little bias towards RPG's and may have exaggerated the numbers a bit. But Xenoblade X should at least be at 1m right now.
@FX102A Personally I think Dragon Quest is kinda niche outside of Japan (with a vocal western audience). Secondly it's unfair to rate the two side by side considering Fire Emblem is a tactical RPG and not a turn based one.
News: Nintendo games sell well on Nintendo platform with literally no other competition.
@Spoony_Tech I agree with the point you're making, and that's really the nub of the comparison. Software on the 3DS didn't cut it last year and thus couldn't drive sales, whereas good games kept the Wii U ticking along at its level. That's likely the topic of my editorial for today, but I'm still ironing it out.
But it is fair to compare them, it's just the 3DS didn't have a great year for games!
Please does anyone know the sales figures for the brilliant Captain Toad?? Never heard it mentioned.
Thank you
@Peach64 Xenoblade Chronicles X sold over 200,000 copies in the United States last month.
Where are you getting your numbers from ?
I wonder what is a breakeven sales amount and if Nintendo see a million sales as good.
A million for the Wii U is good, just under 10% of console owners bought the game.
But ....... Lets say a gamer has a voucher £ ($) 75 to spend on games. Two years ago they may well have bought two games. That's two sales, each sale closer to the million figure.
Today the same person may well buy one game and three Amiibos. One less game sale.
Amiibos will ultimately effect game sales resulting in fewer games being released.
@Spoony_Tech I am Zelda fan and I've enjoyed the 30 or so hours of tri force heroes I've played. And thereis still plenty of great single player zeldas to keep me happy.
Closing in on 13 million Wii U's sold worldwide. Is it just me, or is that figure really not as bad as what people say when you consider Nintendo have effectively done it all on their own with their own IP's, with little to no third party support, no massive advertising campaigns and no huge price drops?!
Figures for Splatoon are just incredible. Speechless.
Splatoon is making bank. Damn
Dang. Im genuinely surprised by how good some of these numbers are.
It's crazy how Animal Crossing: HHD sold so much in JPN compared to everywhere else. Not that it sold more but that it's almost neck to neck (49%), especially compared to the other games.
Glad to see Tri Force Heroes also makes the million sales. It's a different take but still a good game despise what others on the internet (mostly the ones that haven't played it) may say. Edit: sold more than even Four Swords Adventures which haven't made the million mark.
Surprised (and happy) to see Wooly World sell over a million!
@Mineral
He probably used Chartz.
NPD January numbers aren't due out until February 11th.
There was no official numbers released on XCX for the U.S. in the last NPD thread on NeoGaf.
I wish Xenoblade X had sold well enough to be on the list. The game deserves to be played by tens of millions, but I doubt that'll happen unless Nintendo ports it to PS4 and Xbone (which obviously won't happen)
It is a shame XCX doesn't seem to have hit the million copies sold. It is a great game and could have been a heavy hitter for Christmas, if only Nintendo would have promoted it...
Seems those predicting doom for titles like Mario Kart 8 have been proven wrong quite impressively: http://www.polygon.com/2014/5/15/5718168/mario-kart-series-sales. I'm pretty stunned by the attach rate for the game, despite knowing it's likely where the majority of console sales came from, not to mention all the bundles that included the title likely bolstering those numbers.
@Xenocity Yeah there was. I believe it was >200k according to one of the posts on that thread. I'll find the post and link it later.
Splatoon reaching 4 million on a 10 million console is quite impressive, glad to know it's a hit. There's several games that really don't deserve to be on here though (Happy Home Designer and Triforce Heroes to be exact).
@Bolt_Strike FWIW, a 3DS game would need something like a 2% attach rate to get 1 million sales by now.
@Dakt According to VGChartz, Xenoblade Chronicles X has sold over 700,000 copies. Innacuracy and all that, though this would have made it an even larger seller than Bayonetta 2 in the same number of months.
Superb success for Splatoon. I'm not that big a fan myself, but it's great to see a new IP being such a smash. Nintendo consistently launch new IP but over the last few years they've tended to be smaller EShop and/or puzzle games. This is the first major one they've really got behind for a while and it's a runaway success. Bloodborne had sold 2 million as of last September so Splatoon will have sold a lot more than that.
Splatoon is magic. Amazing new IP by an incredibly talented, creative young development team. I knew it sold a crap ton of copies, but I did not know it was at 4 million plus!
Also, MK 8 is such a beast. My all time favorite game, so I'm very happy to see it's absurdly high sales numbers.
@Bolt_Strike Actually the Wii U is near 13 million in sales now. But the Splatoon numbers are still incredible.
@DarkCoolEdge This is from April 1st-December. Majora's Mask came out and sold the majority of it's sales between Feb-March so it wasn't included in the list no. But it is over a million, has been for awhile.
Even when Nintendo is doomed and dead, they always seem to have around ten millionsellers every year - not even counting third party games - for the last 20 years!
I don't think anyone else is capable of that. Most companies struggle to have even one game hitting 1 million.
@RoomB31 Again true, but I feel it is growing.
Again also true, but there are now so many variations of the "JRPG" genre that you have to stop somewhere. At least you can say that Fire Emblem is probably the most "Mainstream" JSRPG around (not counting FF Tactics as its own franchise).
@GuruOfGreatness I know. It is funny that 58M [3DS] +13M [Wii U]> 36M [PS4]+18M(?)[Xbox One]+12M(?) [Vita]. Yet, the lesser of this inequality gets all of the support....
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