Given Animal Crossing: New Horizons is one of the only ways for many people to socialize with their family and friends right now, it’s no surprise the cute life simulator for the Nintendo Switch is selling extremely well.
Nintendo says it sold 13.41 million copies of the game in the first six weeks since its release ending in April. Even more impressively, most of those sales came in the game’s first 11 days of being available.
Regarding console sales, Nintendo shipped slightly over 21 million Switch consoles throughout its financial year, surpassing its forecast of 18 million handily. This brings the Switch’s lifetime worldwide sales to 55.7 million. To further put this number in perspective, the Switch has now sold more than the combined lifetime sales of the Nintendo 64 (32.93 million) and the Gamecube (21.74 million). The console also surpassed the Super Nintendo’s (SNES) sales this holiday season and is only 6.13 million units behind the Nintendo Entertainment System’s (NES) lifetime sales.
Nintendo says it plans to ship 19 million Switch consoles by the end of March 31st, 2021. In terms of year-end revenue, Nintendo’s earnings increased year-over-year to 1.3 trillion yen (roughly $17 billion CAD), with its forecasts predicting sales of 1.2 trillion yen (roughly $15 billion CAD) in 2020. The company released a smaller version of the console called the Switch Lite that doesn’t include the ability to connect to a television back in November.
“It appears that delays in production and shipping are gradually recovering,” said Nintendo in its earnings report. “However, we may be affected if there continue to be issues involving the procurement of necessary components. In addition, if the impact of COVID-19 is prolonged or worsens further, it may disrupt the product supply.”
Looking to the future, the biggest Switch game on the horizon is a remake of Wii JRPG Xenoblade Chronicles, along with several older titles that have also released on other consoles making their way to the Switch, including Bioshock: The Collection, XCOM 2 Collection, Borderlands Legendary Collection and The Wonderful 101: Remastered. That said, the Japanese gaming giant will likely announce several new Switch titles in the coming months.
Source: Nintendo
