9m units of Mario Odyssey lead incredible nine months for Nintendo

Nintendo has released its financial results for the nine-month period ended December 2017, with sales increasing 175.5 per cent year-on-year and reaching ¥857bn (£5.5bn). Meanwhile, operating profit surged an impressive 494.6 per cent year-on-year to reach ¥156bn (£1.01bn).

The Switch has a lot to do with these good results, with Nintendo revealing that the console has shifted 12.13m units during this nine-month period, while software sales reached 47.10m units. Super Mario Odyssey led the charge with 9.07m copies sold, followed by Mario Kart 8 Deluxe with its 7.33m units and Splatoon 2 with 4.91m copies shifted. This “[brings] to 8 the total number of million-seller [Switch] titles for this fiscal year including the titles of other software publishers,” the report said.

The Switch also boosted digital sales for the company, which were up 87 per cent year-on-year, reaching ¥43.1bn (£0.28bn).

Meanwhile, 3DS hardware sales have decreased nine per cent year-on-year and 3DS software sales were down 33 per cent during the same period. However, Nintendo noted that 3DS hardware “sales grew during the holiday season in the US” and that “sales of Pokémon Ultra Sun and Pokémon Ultra Moon have grown to 7.17 million units.”

Mobile games continued to perform well, with “smart devices and IP related income” up 172 per cent year-on-year, reaching ¥29.1bn (£0.19bn).

On the back of these strong results, the platform holder has revised its forecast for the full year ending March 31st 2018: Nintendo now expects profit to reach ¥160bn (£1.03) by the end of that period, having previously announced ¥120bn (£0.77). Revenue is now expected to reach ¥1.02 trillion for that period, against a previously expected ¥960bn.