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The Nintendo Switch will soon surpass the Nintendo DS console
Nintendo's Switch console has surpassed 132 million units sold, but the company is still tight-lipped about its successor.
According to Nintendo's latest sales report for the last quarter, sales of the Switch console are still very good. It grew by 2.4 percent year-on-year, with the OLED model being the most popular. An additional 4.69 million of these were sold, as gamers are apparently willing to pay extra for a better display or simply upgrade from an older model.
On a conference call after the results were announced, Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa declined to comment on plans despite rumors of a successor to the Switch console coming out in 2024.
Sales figures show that the Switch is closing in on the Nintendo DS and will likely soon become the company's best-selling console, but for now it still lags behind the record number of 154 million Nintendo DS consoles sold.
In terms of game sales, Pikmin 4 sold 2.61 million units, making it the best-selling game in the series. 1.36 million were sold in Japan alone, proving the series' popularity in Nintendo's home country. Pikmin 1 and 2 were previously released on the GameCube console, and Pikmin 3 was released on the WiiU console, both of which fared poorly compared to the Switch.
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom has sold a total of 19.5 million units, which is a good one and a half million more than the last disclosure of sales results. It's the ninth best-selling game on the console, still trailing Breath of the Wild's 31.15 million units sold.
Nintendo stated that sales of its Mario games increased following the success of The Super Mario Bros. An additional 3.22 million units of Mario Kart were sold this fiscal year, including the DLC expansion. With a total of 57.01 million units sold, it remains the number one Switch game. That means more than 40 percent of Switch owners own a copy of Mario Kart at the same time.
Digital sales accounted for 50.2 percent of total sales, although the ratio of digital to physical sales was down year-over-year due to strong physical sales of Tears of the Kingdom. This proves that - even though the digital market is growing for Nintendo - the biggest games are still selling well in physical form.
Nintendo has raised its annual profit forecast, which analysts say is due to better sales of key franchises. Nintendo's sales rose 21.2 percent in the first half of the fiscal year, while operating profit rose 27 percent.
