Nintendo made $53 million off Super Mario Run

Super Mario Run generated $53 million in sales for Nintendo. That’s a lot of dough, but the company expected more.

On December 15, 2016, Super Mario Run released on the iOS. From the trailers, this game looked like a ton of fun. Many people believed it would be free, but it was priced at $9.99, which turned a lot of people off. Nintendo still managed to gain $53 million from it, though.

Before we get into how good or bad that is for the company, let’s talk about the price of the game. Most consumers didn’t enjoy the pricing of the game because it’s for a mobile device. On the other hand, for people like us, that was an absolute steal considering it’s a Mario game. However, it’s clear not everybody has this mindset.

Back to what the app made, that’s quite a lot of money. Unfortunately for Nintendo, it didn’t meet their expectations. According to the Wall Street Journal, that revenue isn’t so much for a company that’s used to selling games at a more expensive price.

But, for a mobile game, that’s a great amount of money. It’s also been out for only two months, which is also very impressive. Another interesting stat is 78 million people downloaded the game and more than five percent paid for all of the content.

Serkan Toto from the WSJ claims that this is “amazing.” Other apps that are priced at an even cheaper price can’t even hit that five percent mark. So, in one way, it’s a success. But, overall, Nintendo did expect more. They should expect more downloads once the game releases on Android devices in March.

What the company needs to focus on now is getting players to return to the game. As we stated before, many were turned off at the price and simply deleted the app. What they can do is lower the price, which is unlikely, and add more content, which they’re already doing.

For example, an easy mode has been added to the game. This is great for casual gamers who are just trying to have a good time.

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Nintendo isn’t done with the mobile gaming market either. Fire Emblem Heroes is slated to release sometime today (February 2) and an Animal Crossing game is also in the works.