Sensor Tower
Sensor TowerIt may not have multiplayer, it may be loaded with microtransactions, but people really, really like Mario Kart. Nintendo’s newest mobile offering, Mario Kart Tour, has broken the one-day download record for not just its own mobile games, but all mobile games.
The previous record was held by none other than Pokémon GO, which had 6.7 million downloads on day one. Mario Kart Tour racked up 10.1 million downloads, breaking that record and dwarfing other games like Clash Royale and Fortnite, according to data from Apptopia. (Update: Sensor Tower actually clocks Mario Kart Tour with 20 million downloads in 24 hours)
As for Nintendo’s own offering (ie. not those made by Niantic and The Pokémon Company), Mario Kart Tour has effectively doubled the day one installs for Super Mario Run, and everything else is barely a blip by comparison. Mario Kart Tour has hit #1 in overall rank in 93 countries at the time of this writing.
Revenue is a different story, however. Sensor Tower reports that while Mario Kart Tour is making way, way more money on day one than the recent release of Dr. Mario World did, that it’s still behind the day one revenue numbers of Fire Emblem Heroes, at least in terms of ranking. FE was #17 for iPhone revenue in the US on day one while it was #5 in Japan. Mario Kart Tour is currently #19 in the US and #25 in Japan for day one.
Mario Kart Tour
NintendoMario Kart is routinely one of the best-sellers on any Nintendo console it’s released for, so it should be no surprise that it has put up big numbers for a mobile release, though this big? That is a little surprising.
Whether Mario Kart Tour has staying power is another story. The game is monetized in a far different fashion than traditional Mario Kart games, with a Fire Emblem-like gacha model for better racers (purchased with gems), and an odd $5 a month subscription model where an entire tier of racing (200cc) is gated behind it. But Nintendo seems very much done with trying to make up-front pricing work like with Super Mario Run’s experiment with a free demo then a big charge for the full game. They’re going down a far more traditional road with a free game injected with microtransactions, though gameplay itself is on point, at least once you get used to the mobile controls.
This is already a hit for Nintendo, we’ll just have to see how big of a hit as time goes on.
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