The earnings reports have been coming thick and fast this week, with Microsoft having posted strong growth in its second-quarter report while Apple announced a record-laden start to its fiscal year. Now, Nintendo has released its nine months earnings report with lots of good news for the Switch to be found.
In terms of software sales records, Super Mario Party saw 5.3 million units shifted, while Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Pokémon: Let's Go, Eevee! managed to notch up a combined total of 10 million sales. However, one title managed to eclipse them all on the hybrid console, namely Super Smash Bros. Ultimate that managed to rack up a whopping 12.08 units alone despite being released one week into December. The latest installment in the Smash Bros. franchise managed to rack up the three million of those sales in the first 11 days, making it both the fastest selling title in the series but also on the Switch.
Nintendo also noted strong sales in Switch hardware, with 14.49 million units of the latter sold during the nine-month period, an increase of 19.5% compared to the same time last fiscal year. This was driven by a huge uptick in corresponding software sales, with 94.64 units shifted, a mammoth improvement of 100.9% year-on-year for the same period. However, the Nintendo 3DS failed to enjoy the same success with just 2.31 million consoles sold so far this year, representing a significant drop of 60.5%, perhaps signaling the beginning of the end for the aging platform. The company's hardware results were rounded off by its NES and SNES Classic consoles which racked up 5.83 million in units sold as of the end of Q3.
With respect to forecasts, the gaming company anticipates Switch hardware sales for the fiscal year to reach 17 million. If this projection holds true, Nintendo will have fallen short of its target of 20 million by 15% but titles such as Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe and Yoshi's Crafted World could help entice further console sales in addition to other major releases from software publishers.
All in all, it's been a healthy year so far for Nintendo, with ¥997.2 billion (~$8.97 billion) in combined sales (up ¥140 billion year-on-year) and ¥220 billion (~$1.98 billion) in operating profits. Of course, it remains to be seen how well the company can round things out.
Source: Nintendo (1), Nintendo (2)
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