Nintendo's massive $741 million mistake

Despite tech heavyweights Nintendo and Apple putting serious money into the project, the financial results have been less than desirable. Photo / 123RF

When Super Mario Run was released on the iPhone last December, it was tipped to be one of the top five grossing iOS games of all time.

As the first Mario game for a piece of hardware not built by Nintendo, Super Mario Run received an unprecedented amount of publicity from Apple and the Japanese gaming company.

And while it was downloaded more than 78 million times, the mobile game was largely unsuccessful for Nintendo, with the company failing to capitalise on A$741 million of revenue.

The problem was in the way Nintendo distributed Super Mario Run - the game included a few free levels, but cost $10 to unlock the full experience.

Even though the game was downloaded over 78 million times, roughly only five per cent of those paid the $10 for the entire game.

While that five per cent equates to around $39m in revenue, it falls well short of its competition.

To put things into perspective, popular augmented reality game Pokemon Go and strategy game Clash Royale earned $A192m and $A132m during the first month of their releases, respectively.

Even more interesting is the fact both Pokemon Go and Clash Royale didn't require any money upfront, with revenue coming from in app purchases - evidence people don't want to pay a fixed cost for a mobile game.

It must also be added Nintendo would only receive a portion of Super Mario Run's $39m of revenue, with Apple taking a 30 per cent cut of anything sold on its App Store.
Profits would have also been lost in the cost of making and marketing the mobile game.
Maybe next time, Nintendo.