These Are Nintendo's Lifetime Hardware and Software Numbers

Nintendo’s quarterly earnings may not have been too strong, and the Wii U is staging a fight for its life, but one thing is for certain: when taken as a whole, Nintendo’s historic sales are, in a word, impressive.

Let’s go through the numbers console-by-console and handheld-by-handheld and see just how well each one did. All sales numbers are accurate and up-to-date as of the end of December, 2013.

NES/Famicom

The NES (or Family Computer, if you’re Japanese) launched in 1983 in the east, 1985 in North America, and was out in Europe and Australia alike by 1987. It was Nintendo’s first piece of mainstream hardware and had an undeniable impact on the gaming industry. Here are its life-to-date sales.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
NES/Famicom	61.91 Million	500.01 Million	8.08

NES’ attach rate of over eight games per console sold is strong, but most impressive is that overall number. During the NES’ lifecycle around the world, it managed to sell half a billion games… and this was long before the availability of digital titles.

Game Boy

The Game Boy emerged in Japan in North America in 1989 and began to spread to other parts of the world by 1990. It, alongside the NES, represented a time when Nintendo completely dominated gaming. The NES had no equal, and neither did the Game Boy. Future iterations of the Game Boy hardware (Pocket and Color, but included here) gave it significant staying power.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
Game Boy	118.69 Million	501.11 Million	4.22

A glaring number here is the attach rate. Game Boy is Nintendo’s second best-selling piece of hardware in its history, but it also has one of the weakest attach rates.

SNES/Super Famicom

The successor to the NES, the Super Nintendo (also known as the SNES; Super Famicom in Japan), launched in late 1990 in Japan, in 1991 in North America, and elsewhere in the world in 1992. It, too, left an indelible mark on the gaming industry, but unlike the NES, it had real competition in the form of SEGA’s Genesis (known in parts of the world as the Mega Drive). This, of course, cut into its total sales numbers, seen below.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
SNES/Super Famicom	49.1 Million	379.06 Million	7.72

Lower hardware sales led, in turn, to lower software sales and a slightly softer attach rate. With that said, the attach rate is quite near that of NES’.

Nintendo 64

The Nintendo 64 launched in 1996 in Japan and North America and elsewhere in the world in 1997, and like the SNES before it, it encountered staunch competition in the market. Unlike the SNES, however, the N64 couldn’t wage battle against its competitor effectively, relegating it to a distant second place during the generation. Still, N64 carved out a significant niche, selling quite a bit of software alongside fairly paltry hardware numbers.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
Nintendo 64	32.93 Million	224.97 Million	6.83

Weaker hardware sales led to weaker software sales, which naturally dinged the console’s attach rate. Still, N64 saw some great games in its lifetime, including two games widely considered to be among the best ever released: Super Mario 64 and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Game Boy Advance

Launched in 2001 around the world and wedged into the timeframe right before Nintendo released the successor to the N64 – the GameCube – GBA is well-remembered. It was affordable, it had a great library of games, and it had a bit of staying power, too, though it was quickly eclipsed by Nintendo’s hyper-popular DS line after only a few years on the market.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
Game Boy Advance	81.51 Million	377.42 Million	4.63

GBA didn’t live alone on the market for long – DS interrupted its flow – so its low attach rate could possibly be attributed to that. Given a few more years of uninterrupted vibrancy, its attach rate would have likely been much higher.

GameCube

Nintendo’s GameCube was – by far – its least-successful home console, but there’s a major catch when we talk about it: its attach rate is rather impressive, because even though it barely passed 20 million in worldwide, lifetime sales, it had a fervent and dedicated fanbase that bought lots of games for it. Here, see for yourself.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
GameCube	21.74 Million	208.57 Million	9.59

Not only was GameCube’s attach rate of over nine and a half games per console impressive; it was, at the time, the highest attach rate of any Nintendo hardware up to that point in time, and still holds the crown today.

DS

Nintendo’s single most popular piece of hardware in its history is its tiny, two-screened handheld, the DS. Launched in Japan and North America in 2004 and elsewhere in the world in 2005, Nintendo DS’ success is legendary. It is, indeed, the best-selling piece of hardware in the history of gaming, just barely eclipsing Sony’s popular PlayStation 2 console. And lots of games were sold, too.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
DS	153.98 Million	942.32 Million	6.12

DS’ attach rate isn’t as extraordinary as you’d expect, but taking the two individual numbers on their own – of hardware and software sold – it’s easy to see where the “it prints money” meme for the DS came from.

And then there are DS’ best-selling games. These numbers will floor you.

Game Title	Release Year	Copies Sold
Animal Crossing: Wild World	2005	11.7 Million
Brain Age	2005	19 Million
Brain Age 2	2005	14.88 Million
Mario Kart DS	2005	23.34 Million
New Super Mario Bros.	2006	30.38 Million
Nintendogs	2005	23.94 Million
Pokémon Black/White	2010	15.42 Million
Pokémon Diamond/Pearl	2006	17.63 Million
Pokémon Heart Gold/Soul Silver	2009	12.67 Million
Super Mario 64 DS	2004	10.83 Million

Wii

It makes sense that Nintendo would follow-up its most popular handheld with its most popular console. The Wii represents a high point for Nintendo as far as dominating your living room is concerned. It became a cultural phenomenon, and its impressive hardware and software sales are all the proof you need to know that, for a few years, Nintendo was just about everywhere.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
Wii	100.9 Million	892.34 Million	8.84

Wii’s attach rate flies in the face of the conventional wisdom that many people didn’t purchase games outside of a few big titles, though it’s important to note that Nintendo appears to count Wii Sports – a bundle-in – as a game sold.

Here are some of Wii’s best-selling first-party games to further drive the point home.

Game Title	Release Year	Copies Sold
Mario Kart Wii	2008	34.26 Million
New Super Mario Bros. Wii	2009	27.88 Million
Wii Fit	2007	22.67 Million
Wii Fit Plus	2009	20.86 Million
Wii Play	2006	28.02 Million
Wii Sports	2006	81.99 Million
Wii Sports Resort	2009	31.89 Million
Super Mario Galaxy	2007	11.72 Million
Super Smash Bros. Brawl	2008	11.49 Million

3DS

The 3DS saw early struggles when it first came to the market in 2011, but Nintendo has quickly righted the ship with a deluge of quality games and surging hardware sales that have been amongst the highest in the gaming industry for several years running. Unfortunately for the 3DS, its attach rate is quite weak. In fact, it’s so far the weakest in Nintendo’s history for any of its hardware, console and handheld alike.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
3DS	42.74 Million	152.29 Million	3.56

The good news for 3DS is that its story isn’t entirely written yet. Its low attach rate can be remedied in future years if Nintendo keeps the software coming at a steady rate. And so far, it seems like that is indeed the company’s intention.

Here are some of the best-selling 3DS games from the first party, to date.

Game Title	Release Year	Copies Sold
Animal Crossing: New Leaf	2012	3.86 Million
Kid Icarus: Uprising	2012	1.18 Million
Luigi’s Mansion 2: Dark Moon	2013	1.22 Million
Mario & Luigi: Dream Team	2013	2 Million
Mario Kart 7	2011	8.08 Million
Mario Tennis Open	2012	1.11 Million
New Super Mario Bros. 2	2012	6.42 Million
Nintendogs + Cats	2011	3.28 Million
Paper Mario: Sticker Star	2012	1.97 Million
Pokémon Rumble Blast	2011	1.29 Million
Pokémon X/Y	2013	11.61 Million
Super Mario 3D Land	2011	8.29 Million
The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds	2013	2.18 Million
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D	2011	2.95 Million
Tomodachi Collection	2013	1.82 Million

Wii U

Finally, we’ve come to the Wii U. Its struggles in its first year on the market are well documented; we don’t need to rehash them here. But there’s hope in 2014: the library of upcoming games is promising, and while the Wii U is unlikely to ever reach far beyond GameCube or N64 numbers, it will certainly carve out its niche of gamers who love Nintendo’s high-quality, first party offerings.

Console Name	Hardware Sales	Software Sales	Attach Rate
Wii U	5.86 Million	29.37 Million	5.01

At just a shade over five games sold per console, Wii U is already garnering some steam with those that already own it. Its challenge will continue to be getting people outside of the Nintendo hardcore interested in it. Whether or not that happens remains to be seen.

Yet, Wii U also has some million-sellers worth noting.

Game Title	Release Year	Copies Sold
New Super Mario Bros. U	2012	2.15 Million
Nintendo Land	2012	2.6 Million
Super Mario 3D World	2013	1+ Million
The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD	2013	1+ Million
Wii Party U	2013	1+ Million

Colin Moriarty is IGN’s Senior Editor. You can follow him on Twitter.

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