This post is also going to be known as “why you should look at numbers with skepticism” or even “ways in which journalists use numbers to lie“. But the truth is that the Mobile game Angry Birds has outsold the entire Mario series in terms of number of copies sold.
Presently the bird flinging mobile application has outsold the entire Mario series by 88 million copies. But does this mean that the slingshot pork killing application is an actual threat to one of the oldest and most beloved game characters of all time?
The short answer? No. Nindendo (or rather your average current platform) games generally go for around $60-$70 a pop (even back in the day and keeping inflation in mind the value of your average Nintendo games has remained rather steady) over the years so when you take a look at the monetary breakdown as follows:
[box] Mario has sold 262,000,000 worldwide at $60 per copy = Approximately $15,720,000,000 (Almost 16 Billion Dollars) from just the Mario franchise. [/box]
This is not counting other famous video game series such as Zelda, The Harvest Moon series, Animal Crossing, and and many other titles that can boast a massive fanbase.
Now when you post Mario beside Angry Bird’s 350 Million copies it does seem like a gigantic leap, (especially when you think about the fact that Angry Birds has only been out for 2 years vs. Mario’s 30) but here is that wonderful math for you again:
[box]Angry Birds has sold 350,000,000 copies at $1.00 per copy = Approximately $350,000,000 Alternatively;
If Angry Birds sold 360,000,000 copies at $1.50 per copy = Approximately $525,000,000 dollars would be gained in revenue. [/box]
When you throw down the numbers it doesn’t seem like the titan of the mobile community really has that much to boast about. Furthermore; one must keep in mind that it is currently estimated that 1 in every 2 Americans will own a smartphone by the Christmas of this year. So when we take the United States Population: 312,353,105 (at the time of this post) and divide that by two we get a total of: 156,176552.5 smartphone users out there who can download a quick and casual game on the fly without the hassle of having to run to a GameStop store and/or squirreling money away. Lets just say that as far as availability and price are covered, Angry Birds has a big handle on the casual gamer industry.
Furthermore when you think about the fact that the Wii is one of the fastest selling consoles out there I’m sure you can get behind me on the idea that Nintendo isn’t feeling any kind of pinch from the profits from Angry Birds, and I agree with Nintendo staying out of the mobile market. If Nintendo knows how to do anything, its how to make fun games that are worth the money you put into them. As long as Nintendo keeps making games that are worth playing they aren’t going to have any problems making money, and seeing as how Mr. Mario is basically the icon for the entire gaming industry and community, I don’t think we will see him going anywhere in the future either.