Today Nintendo announced its financial results for the first half of the fiscal year ended on September 30, 2019, and the company provided interesting information about the performance of its games.
First of all, in the table below you can see the business performance in the quarter, with all significant numbers in the black.
Both sales and operating profit show significant improvement year-on-year.
A detailed description of the results reveals that Super Mario Maker 2 has shipped 3.93 million units as of September 30, 2019.
Fire Emblem: Three Houses is at 2.29 million units, and The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening shipped 3.13 million units.
During the six months ended September 30, 2019, for Nintendo Switch, a new model with extended battery life launched in August, followed in September by Nintendo Switch Lite, a system dedicated to handheld gameplay, which is compact and lightweight, making it easy to take on the go.
On the software side, the period saw the release of Super Mario Maker 2 in June, which has sold 3.93 million units, Fire Emblem: Three Houses in July, which has sold 2.29 million units, and The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening in September, which has sold 3.13 million units.
Sales of popular titles released during previous fiscal years and titles by other software publishers also continued to grow, bringing the total number of million-seller titles during this fiscal year to 11, including the titles of other software publishers. As a result, hardware sales reached 6.93 million units (36.7% increase on a year-on-year basis), and software sales reached 58.49 million units (38.8% increase on a year-on-year basis).
For Nintendo 3DS, hardware sales totaled 0.37 million units (62.9% decrease on a year-on-year basis), while software sales totaled 2.60 million units (58.5% decrease on a year-on-year basis).
Turning to our digital business for dedicated video game platforms, the steady growth in sales of downloadable versions of packaged software and download-only software for Nintendo Switch, as well as the contributions of Nintendo Switch Online, helped to bring overall digital sales to 71.6 billion yen (83.0% increase on a year-on-year basis).
In the mobile business, we released two new game applications: Dr. Mario World in July, and Mario Kart Tour in September. Many consumers also continue to enjoy the titles that were released in previous fiscal years, bringing our mobile, IP related income to 19.9 billion yen (6.4% increase on a year-on-year basis).
Moving on to the forecast for the current fiscal year (ending on March 31, 2020)
“There are no changes to the original financial forecast for this period, which was published on April 25, 2019.
Nintendo Switch titles slated for release include Ring Fit Adventure (October), Luigi’s Mansion 3 (October), Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield (November), and Animal Crossing: New Horizons (March 2020).
In addition, other software publishers likewise plan to release a wide variety of compelling titles. We aim to further invigorate the platform through the continuous release of new titles combined with efforts to strengthen sales of popular existing titles.
For the Nintendo 3DS family, we will continue to fully utilize the platform’s rich software library to appeal to consumers purchasing game hardware for the first time, while continuing to drive sales of evergreen titles that leverage the hardware install base.
For our mobile business, operations will focus on efforts that encourage consumers to continue to enjoy playing the new Dr. Mario World and Mario Kart Tour applications, as well as existing applications that were released in previous fiscal years.”
If you want to learn more, you can check out an update of shipments for the Nintendo Switch.
You can also compare Nintendo’s results with those related to the previous quarter, revealed in July.
