For any of you who doubted the power of Mario Kart, Nintendo have announced that the game has sold a staggering 1.2 million copies in its first weekend of release, from its initial release on Thursday in Japan, through Friday where it released worldwide, until Sunday.
That works out to around 1/5th of Wii U systems sold when last reported, though obviously the game will have boosted sales that bit more, with UK sales of Nintendo’s console increasing by 666% percent this week compared to last, as we reported earlier today alongside the UK charts.
It still only made it to number 2 in those charts, behind Watch Dogs which was in first place, suggesting that it hasn’t done as well in the UK, or that Watch Dogs has sold even more.
Coming weeks will tell us whether Mario Kart 8 has boosted the sales of the Wii U enough or not, but 1.2 million sales seems like a massive head start for the game – it will be interesting to see whether they can keep that position or if someone throws a figurative blue shell in the works soon.
Source: Press release
stonyk
Bought a wii u with this and will probably only ever have this. Awesome game but having had a ps4 since release one thing I did notice about the wii u. It’s soooooo slow.
Any chance of an update Nintendo?
Kennykazey
L.O.L.
There’s an update with a quick start function out today. :-D
Lyts1985
It’s a Wii U exclusive and yet it’s sale were 2nd only to a multiplatform well-hyped game. Very impressive :-)
rept0n
Best next-gen (ahem) game to date, and testament to how good Nintendo can be – a few more titles of this quality and mass appeal and they’ll have nothing to worry about – shame it’s taken them so long.
The Von Braun
This boosted Wii U sales by 666% then (cue Omen music….:-) )can we have some idea of what sales figures were the week before?.
Only ask as seen some claim sales went up by 700% and sales of Wii U week before Mario Kart 8 were around 1,655 machines sold in UK.
Then you’ve places claiming Watchdogs saw PS4 hardware sales jump by 94%, but again give no idea of what sales were week before Watchdogs was released.
I’m getting 100% confused by all of it…..
Think if sites (in general) are going to post up percentage’s of sales increases, it’d be better to include actual before/after figures where possible.
Blair Inglis
We don’t have the actual sales data, that’s the thing.
Hobby
Wait until Smash 4 comes out for Wii U. Then the Wii U will actually surpass the legendary PS4.