‘Mario,’ ‘Zelda’ Show Nintendo’s Ability to Translate IP Across Media
Amid all the PlayStation and Xbox mudslinging over M&A, Nintendo’s enduring success in video games cannot be ignored.
The company disclosed its fiscal first-quarter earnings Thursday, covering a period that included “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” in April, which earned more than $1.3 billion globally, as well as “The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom,” an instant success upon its May release.
Positive earnings for Nintendo were expected, but the quarter ending June 30 rang in as the most profitable fiscal Q1 ever for the Nintendo Switch steward, surpassing the record achieved in 2020 thanks to “Animal Crossing: New Horizons” during the first quarter fully affected by pandemic lockdowns.
“Tears of the Kingdom” is now the No. 9 title on the Switch, having sold nearly 20 million units in less than two months. Its predecessor, “Breath of the Wild,” was a launch title when the Switch began shipping in March 2017 and rests at more than 30 million games sold, a good sign that “Tears” is on track to surpass it.
By comparison, Sony Interactive Entertainment’s own hyped sequels to popular exclusives have been struggling to meet the sales achieved by their predecessors in recent years. Ahead of the premiere of its HBO series adaptation, PlayStation studio Naughty Dog revealed its franchise “The Last of Us” had sold through more than 37 million games as of December 2022, but 2020’s “The Last of Us Part II” accounts for around 10 million of that number, per a June 2022 disclosure.
Just like the “Mario” movie has done for Nintendo sales, the success of HBO’s “The Last of Us” has helped boost sales for the franchise, as confirmed by SIE president and CEO Jim Ryan, though exact numbers weren’t cited. And while successful, the “Uncharted” film’s $400 million haul in 2022 is nowhere near what “Mario” made.
Through PlayStation Productions, the company has a film adaptation for “Gran Turismo” due later this month, and a series adaptation of “Twisted Metal” bowed on Peacock at the end of July, but its upcoming earnings might just paint a better picture of how successful its acclaimed HBO series was for the gaming side of its business.
Another highly successful PlayStation exclusive is 2018’s “Marvel’s Spider-Man,” which has a direct sequel due later this year in October, following 2020’s “Miles Morales” continuation. While the PlayStation franchise’s plot is separate from that of Sony Pictures’ “Spider-Man” universe and “Spider-Verse” animated films, it incorporates many of the characters from both, with Venom and Kraven the Hunter set to appear in the next game.
If the “Spider-Man” sequel doesn’t add significantly to the franchise’s more than 33 million sales to date, it’ll underscore the issue of mounting costs and longer development cycles for AAA games in the current console generation, where PlayStation’s biggest releases cost as much as $200 million to make. “Tears of the Kingdom” took its time to come together, but graphics for the Nintendo Switch max out at 720p resolution, significantly lower than the 4K standard for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series.
