Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Retains Its Crown In Nintendo Switch Best-Selling Games List

By the end of the year, I hope to see Mario 3D World and Monster Hunter Rise getting into this list. I know the can do it.

Very surprised by Mario Kart 8 Deluxe still sitting at Nr. 1. That it extended its lead over Animal Crossing: New Horizons even more so. I thought it'd be a safe bet that AC had overtaken it but I guess Mario Kart 'legs' are stronger. I know wonder if AC will ever overtake it. Something to take a good look at during the next report I suppose.

@the_beaver Monster Hunter Rise won't, as it's a third party game Nintendo can't release those figures.

New Horizons sales are now really slowing down now last reports by end of December it sold 31 million so it only sold a bit of a million from January to March of this year

@the_beaver You will mever see Monster Hunter Rise on this list, they only count first party games.

Best-selling Nintendo games of all time:
1) Wii Sports [Wii]: 82.90 million
2) Super Mario Bros [NES] : 40.24 million
3) Mario Kart Wii [Wii]: 37.38 million
4) Mario Kart 8 DX [NSW]: 35.39 million
5) Wii Sports Resort [Wii]: 33.13 million
6) Animal Crossing New Horizons [NSW]: 32.63 million
7) Pokemon Red/Blue/Green [GB]: 31.38 million
8) New Super Mario Bros [NDS]: 30.80 million
9) New Super Mario Bros Wii [Wii]: 30.32 million
10) Tetris [GB]: 30.26 million

Animal Crossing New Horizons will comfortably outsell Wii Sports Resort by the end of this current fiscal quarter.

@westman98 If you include WiiU sales, Mario Kart 8 goes to just short of 44m

New Super Mario Bros U Deluxe has out sold Splatoon 2 and Pokemon Lets Go in the past 12 months.

10 games above 10M!!!! This is crazy!

@Haruki_NLI Well, in our minds it will be XD

And that is why Nintendo are in no rush to make Mario Kart 9.

32.63 million in the first year is seriously impressive for Animal Crossing or any game for that matter. Most games don't even sell 1 million units over their entire lifespan. Also that's over 40% attach rate even big games like GTA don't have that kind of attach rate. And closing in on 3 times as many sales as New Leaf's total sales.
That's a gigantic leap forward for the series.

@Duncanballs no rush to make it? I suspect it’s been in the works for sometime now, Nintendo are always preparing for the next instalment and I believe Mario Kart 9 will be more grand then it’s predecessor.

@BiscuitCrumbsInMyBed I'll rephrase if you like. In no rush to "release" Mario Kart 9.

@Duncanballs I dunno, Nintendo may surprise us all at e3. I’m pretty hopeful we will hear something about the next Mario kart this year. I thinks it’s been in development a long while. I’m hopeful anyway

@BiscuitCrumbsInMyBed They might but when they almost have a 1 to 2 attach rate with Mario Kart 8, it would be unwise to kill those sales with a new release. Equally as hopeful but whilst 8 is still making a sizeable profit for them I think it is a few years off or even next gen.

@KBuckley27
The only Nintendo games that sold more than Animal Crossing last quarter were Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury (a new release) and Mario Kart 8 DX.

Animal Crossing is obviously not going to sell anywhere near as much in 2021 compared to its record-breaking 2020, nor will it have the uniquely insane evergreen legs of Mario Kart 8 DX, but it is still selling very well.

Isn't MK8 still a pack-in with some console bundles, though? 🤔
It's a bit of a BS sale figure if it happens to come with the console.

Game/Console ratio is really good.

Exclusives are Nintendo's best. If only they were crazy enough to drop the prices.

Very glad both SSBU and Splatoon 2 sold well, both solid "gamers games" that have widespread appeal. MK8 was also great, some more DLC tracks or MK9 on the horizon perhaps? It was one of the first Nintendo games to do paid DLC and did it brilliantly at a reasonable price. I'd happily throw a few £7s Ninties way for 4 tracks a piece.

I figured MK8D would still be ahead. Its sales have only sped up each year rather than slowing down so it'd take massive sales for another game to overtake it.

If Mario Kart 8...a port of a SEVEN YEAR-OLD Wii U game...is still sitting at #1 in software sales for the Switch, it begs the question: what would the reaction to a Mario Kart 9/Nintendo Kart be like?

I've posed this question here numerous times, and for some reason certain folks like to shoot down the idea, citing those sales figures. But you know who doesn't really care about sales figures? Me or most other gamers who've long since done everything there is to do in a given game. MK 8, I've been there and done that, on BOTH the Wii U and the Switch. I break it out every now and then for local multiplayer, but aside from that I'm basically finished with it. Even ACNH, which I've played for hundreds of hours, I haven't touched in months because its "updates" are essentially the same stuff we got last year.

Sales figures are nice...nice for corporations, nice for executives, CEOs, and stockholders, and yes, nice for gamers who get to experience a great game. But there's a point where you reach saturation and/or those gamers have wrapped up their experiences with that product and are asking, "What's next".

The Switch needs another Mario Kart. MK 8's sales aren't so much because it's a great game (it is) as because it's (with apologies to Smash Bros. Ultimate and Mario Party) the only pick-up-and-play, accessible multiplayer first-party title on the system. They're because it's still the only Mario Kart on the system. Whether it happens this year or not, a new, fresh installment is due and it needs to happen.

@Prizm I mean, wii sports as well then

@AtlanteanMan II'd like a new racer too but with MK8's sales ever increasing alongside record system sales. MK9 could only possibly absorb sales that MK8D would get anyway.

I'm not surprised the Mario Kart team prioritised games like ARMS instead of a MK9.

@AtlanteanMan Remember that Nintendo is a corporation first and foremost. Their primary responsibility is to their share holders and investors, not gamers. Simply put, they don't care about you or your feelings. Whether you're sick of MK8 or not is irrelevant to them. It's still making them stupid amounts of money. They won't release the next game in the series if it means eating away at those numbers.

Stick the name "pokemon" and even the trash gain valor.

This list of top selling games illuminating. As a Wii U owner, only one, Mario Odyssey, is really new at all (not interested in Animal Crossing). I'm still waiting for the next Nintendo home console so we can get real next gen and different games. The Wii U had awesome games and the Switch is just a portable Wii U for the most part looking at the top sellers.

@PawaaKuriinYYZ Oh, I get that, believe me. I also get that it's why there's a constant disconnect between what countless hobbyists want (and ask for) and what we tend to get from the industry, year in and year out.

Even so, Nintendo's higher-ups have to know there are fan expectations for the next Mario Kart, and by this point cannibalizing the sales of MK 8 shouldn't matter all that much to them (as I said, inevitably it will reach a point of saturation). And that's assuming that it would eat into MK 8's sales in the first place; after all, consumers readily support multiple installments of other major IPs such as Mario and Zelda on the same console, and another Mario Kart would mean another local multiplayer option for families underneath the Christmas tree.

Nintendo's approach with the Switch has been, to be honest, comparatively lazy in terms of original projects against the ratio of ports from earlier systems. Yes, again it's been profitable for them, and it likely means we'll see more of the same from them as a result. But I believe that at some point they'll release a new installment of Mario Kart for the Switch, if not this year then likely as the main attraction for a future Christmas season. In any case, I'm more than ready, and I'm sure no one else here will be disappointed to see it announced if/when it happens.

@AtlanteanMan And if Nintendo releases a new home console and has new next gen games, they can build up a library for the Switch 2's ports of those games. The same strategy

This looks very similar to a best selling games list for Wii U, from 5 years ago.

I don't know how you would do it, but I would love to see the stats on the number of people who purchased MK8 on the Wii U and then also picked it up on the Switch.

I'm probably one of the last remaining earthlings that has not double dipped and really wishes people would stop buying 8 so Nintendo would make 9.

Damn..when is SMO going to outsell BOTW...YOU KNOW FULL WELL THAT YOU CAN'T MESS WITH THE SUPER MARIO!

It also retains its crown as the only one of the top 10 I've ever played on my Switch. (Or anyone else's.)

@Duncanballs there’s a big gap between a new release and MK8D. If Nintendo wants another 20 million plus selling release a few million that MK8D is, barring an out of the blue hit, it’s gotta be MK9.

I'm starting to believe the next MK won't come until the next console :')

No surprises at all, though a couple of those titles rank pleasantly higher than I would've guessed.

Honestly, with the continued success of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, you'd think Nintendo would be interested in churning out a bit of DLC to rope in those who picked up the installment early and have played it to death lol.

@F_T_Wolf It’s worth noting that Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has been the pack-in game for the holiday Switch bundles for (I think) 2 years now. I’m curious if Animal Crossing would have overtaken it if that weren’t the case.

@AtlanteanMan hmmm, maybe in 2020 but not sure that is laziness but more the global pandemic we have all faced.

Outside 2020 whilst they have ported a fair amount from the wii u era they have released and published a fair amount of new games.

I am actually quite impressed and pleased with what has come out on the Switch so far.

I've pretty much owned every console at some point since the 80s including obscurities like the 3D0, jaguar and virtual boy. In terms of games libraries, Switch would be in my all time top 5 even after only 4 years. For info, Amiga, SNES, Gamecube, Switch and Playstation 3 ..... in no particular order. I know the Amiga isn't technically a console, but we all used it mainly for games back in the day.

@F_T_Wolf
Yeah I don't see New Horizons catching Mario Kart. Mario Kart is almost a guaranteed sale for any new Switch owner. It's that game that pretty much any gamer (or non-gamer for that matter) can get into and enjoy.

Interesting how the chart is almost in chunks. MK8 and ACNH are real close.

Then there's a big gap. Then Smash, Zelda, Odyssey and Pokemon. Another gap.

Then the rest.

I am surprised that mario party sales exceeded splatoon 2, pokemon let's go and mario deluxe.

@westman98 - Yep, Wii Sports sales is such a BS sales figure as well as MK8.

In post 8, @Divinebovine quoted the 'best-selling Nintendo games', and most of those games were included with a console bundle at some point. I mean, Super Mario Bros for NES, Tetris for Gameboy? Sheesh.

@jcboyer515 "Why exactly shouldn't the sale of a game count if it's bundled with a Switch in your opinion?"
It's a dubious sales figure because the buyer may not necessarily want the included game. They're not buying the game based on its own merit.
They're wanting to buy a console and that pack-in bundle may just happen to be the one available at the shop when they buy the Switch. They might not give a crap about MK8 and are buying a Switch for Smash and Animal Crossing.

Back in the day, I bought the original Gameboy and hated the fact that it came with Tetris instead of Mario Land. I never would have purchased Tetris as a standalone game. And yet my 'purchase' is included in the sales figures for Tetris.

@Moistnado except you need to add about 20 million to each sales figure

I'm just happy Clubhouse Games: 51 Worldwide Classics has sold 3.14 Million units globally... which surprisingly is more than Paper Mario: The Origami King, Pikmin 3 Deluxe, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity and others.

Speaking of which, am I the only one who wants an update/DLC to Clubhouse Games? Like with more skill-based games, card games, board games, strategy games, game variations, customization options, robust online (i.e. monthly online leaderboards, ranked matches, stats, tracking, tournaments, gauntlet mode) etc.

I really enjoy & love Clubhouse Games and think it could be expanded upon to be a great Switch hit, especially in these Pandemic times.