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Nintendo breaks record for highest operating profit earned in a fiscal year by a console maker

Celine

Member
Nintendo has just announced its financial results for the full fiscal year ending March 2021 which were record breaking.
In particular the operating profit for the full fiscal year amounted to 640.63 Bn yen which is the highest ever recorded in a fiscal year by any console manufacturer (company or console division in the case of mega corporations).
The previous record holder was Nintendo’s fiscal year ending March 2009 which was the peak of the Wii/DS business.

It is probable that the Switch era will be more profitable than the Wii/DS era for Nintendo.


Top 5 highest operating profits recorded by any console manufacturer (company or console division in the case of mega corporations) until now:

Manufacturer | Fiscal Year | Operating Profits
Nintendo, FY ending March 2021: 640.63 Bn yen
Nintendo, FY ending March 2009: 555.26 Bn yen
Nintendo, FY ending March 2008: 487.22 Bn yen
Nintendo, FY ending March 2010: 356.57 Bn yen
Nintendo, FY ending March 2020: 352.37 Bn yen


source:
 
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Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
Shhhh.
Profits only matter when you are talking Playstation vs. Xbox
Not that important when you throw Nintendo into the mix

No, profits and revenue matter and Nintendo is doing great in both. I think that it is more reasonable for gaming fans to get excited by high revenue numbers unless profits are in the red or near it because they relate to customer demand and popularity of what they offer and people infer/assume things about the state of the industry as a result.

Pure profits focus from fans is a bit less understandable beside epeen waving because you can get them very high on a popular product if you can manage to cut costs a lot (ports, higher priced remasters, etc…). I get people’s point, but I always found it funny that people hated Sony for giving you the launch PS3 about $200-300 below cost (it was then being greedy) and we applaud profits (revenue - costs).

Then again it is good for those like Nintendo that took a risk with the Switch (it is good for a company making only games to build a warchest when you have companies like MS and Apple circling the pond) and are reaping high rewards, but they could have had smaller profits and packed more custom/better HW in the Switch and financed a few more games to reduce draughts.

Look at Animal Crossing’s post launch support: 30 Million something copies, which brought in a lot of revenue, but the software does not scream hyper high budget nor post launch investment (the amount and depth of the software updates has been more on the light side) which helps drive the cost down.
So yeah, just looking at the profits angle leaves something out a bit.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
Thanks for the info. The fact that they're breaking peak Wii/DS records is just crazy to me.
They have something which is as desirable as both (and COVID is helping it even more) and back then DS and Wii were possibly more costly to develop and support for them. Even with similar revenue they possibly reduced costs which massively helped. Nintendo is well run as a business overall.

Let’s see what they invest those profits in.
 

Andyliini

Member
Here are some sales numbers as well:

As of March 31st 2021, the Switch has sold 84,59 million units around the world. This puths Switch ahead of GBA and PSP.

The updated million-sellers list looks like this:
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – 35.39 million
Animal Crossing: New Horizons – 32.63 million
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate – 23.84 million
Zelda: Breath of the Wild – 22.28 million
Pokemon Sword/Shield – 21.10 million
Super Mario Odyssey – 20.83 million
Super Mario Party – 14.79 million
Pokemon: Let’s Go, Pikachu / Eevee – 13.28 million
Splatoon 2 – 12.21 million
New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe – 10.44 million
Ring Fit Adventure – 10.11 million
Luigi’s Mansion 3 – 9.59 million
Super Mario 3D All-Stars – 9.01 million
Super Mario Maker 2 – 7.15 million
Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury – 5.59 million
Zelda: Link’s Awakening – 5.49 million
Clubhouse Games: 51 Worldwide Classics – 3.14 million
Paper Mario: The Origami King – 3.12 million
Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity (outside of Japan) – 3.07 million
Pikmin 3 Deluxe – 2.04 million
Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition – 1.52 million
Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit – 1.27 million

As far as I know, the list only includes games that have sold at least 1 million copies during the fiscal year.
 

carlosrox

Banned
Nintendo Forever.

Love to see it. Look at that list of top selling games. A bunch of top quality games that can't be found anywhere else.

May Nintendo keep doing what they're doing for a long time to come.

Can't wait for what's next for Nintendo. Their next games, their next system, their future in general.

Not even a question that Nintendo deserves all this success and more.
 
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Business

Member
Aaron Paul He Cant Keep Getting Away With This GIF by Breaking Bad
 

Handel

Member
The entire top 5 is all Nintendo...goddamn they're good at making truckloads of money. Well deserved, the Switch is an amazing system. Going to have the highest first party software sales of any system ever, if it hasn't already reached that milestone, which it may well have with six 20+ million sellers, five 10+ million, and many 1m-9m sellers. Just bonkers numbers.
 

StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
holy shit. Killer numbers.

On my phone and don’t wanna go through financial statements on a tiny screen but does Nintendo breakdown sales and profit by hardware vs software? Wondering how profitable the hardware side is.

Who’s the guy a month or two ago who was promoting profits are king when it’s PS vs Xbox, but when Nintendo was involved in the discussion, profit isnt important anymore and it’s all about comparing annual cash flow?
 

noshten

Member


As expected "Other" region is where Nintendo is seeing the most growth in terms of hardware,

Digital Sales are up 68.5% YoY which is the major source of growth in their profits and this is definitely helped by titles like Among Us, Hades, Momotaro, Monster Hunter Rise, Sakuna, etc and their Online services. Nothing mentioned in the release so far about subs but I can see it doubling during COVID YoY

Top 25 Nintendo Switch FY 2021
  1. Animal Crossing: New Horizon - 20.85M
  2. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe - 10.62M
  3. Super Mario 3D All-Stars - 9.02M
  4. Ring Fit Adventure - 7.38M
  5. Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury - 5.59M
  6. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate - 5.01M
  7. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - 4.86M
  8. Super Mario Party - 4.69M
  9. Monster Hunter Rise (Capcom) - 4M
  10. New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe - 3.84M
  11. Pokémon Sword/Pokémon Shield - 3.73M
  12. Age of Calamity (Koei Tecmo) - 3.7M
  13. Super Mario Odyssey - 3.42M
  14. Luigi’s Mansion 3 - 3.26M
  15. Clubhouse Games: 51 Worldwide Classics - 3.14M
  16. Paper Mario: The Origami King - 3.12M
  17. Momotaro (Konami) - >3M?
  18. Splatoon 2 - 2.08M
  19. Pikmin 3 Deluxe - 2.04M
  20. Super Mario Maker 2 - 1.67M
  21. Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition - 1.52M
  22. Pokémon: Let's Go - 1.31M
  23. Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit - 1.27M
  24. The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening - 1.11M
  25. Story Of Seasons: Pioneers Of Olive Town (Marvelous) - 0.7M
TOTAL: 110.93M

So outside the biggest releases we have around 220M software sales that don't include digital only titles(like Among Us). I'm guessing Minecraft, Just Dance, Human Fall Flat, Sakuna, are the games that easily surpass 1 million units this FY. Minecraft in fact is probably selling anywhere between 5th to 15th place, I wouldn't be surprised if its selling more than Smash for example. While Just Dance is probably also a candidate for the Top 20, not

Last year was the first major year for Third Parties on the Switch we had major indie launches like Among Us & Hades; major Japanese launches like Monster Hunter Rise, Age of Calamity & Momotaro, and a few Western major publisher games the biggest of which was Just Dance but this output is about to double or triple as software growth this year is shaping up to be exceptional. Especially as Nintendo grows it's presence in new markets and becomes increasingly important for further growth of third parties.

Emerging markets do play a crucial role for companies like Konami, Capcom, Marvelous, Atlus, Koei Tecmo while Japanese market place a huge role for Western indies like Supergiant Games, as Hades is gearing up for a June launch in the country(game has been in the Top 10 in Korea since launching there in the fall but the Japanese localization seems to have taken much more time).
 

Bodomism

Banned
Nintendo Forever.

Love to see it. Look at that list of top selling games. A bunch of top quality games that can't be found anywhere else.

May Nintendo keep doing what they're doing for a long time to come.

Can't wait for what's next for Nintendo. Their next games, their next system, their future in general.

Not even a question that Nintendo deserves all this success and more.
True!

The best selling XB1 games are also the selling PS4 and PC games.
 

Chukhopops

Member
What’s most impressive is Software sales:
- Bowsers fury at 5.59M after only a quarter
- 3D All Stars at 8.32M (!)
- Animal Crossing at 32M (!!)
- Links Awakening at 5.5M (!!!)

There is clearly demand for remasters, and as long as there is demand there will be supply.

Also I wish good luck to the downplay crew as they are going to have a tough job.
 
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TheDreadLord

Gold Member
The last two years of the Switch have been quite bad. I can't say this is well deserved but it is good to see Nintendo financially still going strong. At least some innovation pops up from time to time.
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
Very impressive, but not completely surprising.

I think 2022 or 2023 FY would be more interesting and closely fought b/w Sony and Nintendo. I think Sony might topple Nintendo in one or both of those years in terms of profitability. Sony recorded >3B during a console launch year when it incurs huge losses.

Either way, the future of gaming seems bright with both Nintendo and Sony kicking asses, and MS looking much better too. Great time to be a gamer.
 

TheDreadLord

Gold Member
Just imagine if Nintendo had a half decent on line service, retro games and better overall services for value.
I find surprising that Nintendo does not a proper retro strategy. Today, they could be selling NES/SNES/N64 consoles (with proper HDMI support) and cartridges at premium price and probably they would be completely sold out.
 

Ozzie666

Member
I find surprising that Nintendo does not a proper retro strategy. Today, they could be selling NES/SNES/N64 consoles (with proper HDMI support) and cartridges at premium price and probably they would be completely sold out.

They could put the Evercade out of business. Could you imagine a micro console, with little cute cartridges? cheap prices of course. It's a license to print even more money..
 

TheDreadLord

Gold Member
They could put the Evercade out of business. Could you imagine a micro console, with little cute cartridges? cheap prices of course. It's a license to print even more money..
And if they were smart, they would make development for these consoles open and more accessible. Hell, until today we get new releases for Atari Jaguar (+75USD each).
 

Bo_Hazem

Banned

Very happy for Nintendo, I honestly hope they replace Xbox as the true competitor to Sony in the home console instead of just portables. I know they can do wonders with more headroom! I'll by the console day one.

How much more is it compared to Xbox numbers? I've never really seen people talk about that here.

Xbox most likely never had any profit in years, MS is hiding it.
 
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