Super Mario Run Revenue ‘Did Not Meet Our Expectations’: Nintendo

HIGHLIGHTS

• Nintendo prefers the monetisation method in Super Mario Run


• This is despite the game not meeting expectations


• It considers cash cows like Fire Emblem: Heroes to be an outlier

Super Mario Run is available on Android which should give it a healthy boost in users, but it has, unsurprisingly, not been the commercial hit Nintendo expected on iOS due to its steep $10 price point.

Revenue from the game "did not meet our expectations," Nintendo President Tatsumi Kimishima said speaking to Asia Nikkei. Previously it was reported that the game's gross revenue hit $30 million in two weeks.

 

Despite this, the company isn’t planning to focus freemium games completely, citing its success with Fire Emblem: Heroes being an outlier.

"We honestly prefer the Super Mario Run model,” a senior company official said.

While the Android version of Super Mario Run will allow more people to experience the game, monetisation isn’t expected to be the main objective. It appears that Nintendo is looking to make good on its claims to use smartphones to introduce its games to a wider audience.

The idea being that it allows them a taste of what to expect in the hope that they purchase its consoles like the Nintendo Switch, which has, from all accounts, been selling quite well. An admirable strategy considering the likes of Sony with its ForwardWorks division seems to be using mobile games to create another revenue stream instead of allowing it to be a gateway drug to the PlayStation ecosystem.

We discuss Super Mario Run and its Android debut at length on Transition, our weekly podcast on all things gaming. You can subscribe to Transition via iTunes or RSS or just listen to this episode by hitting the play button below.