Switch best-selling console in US for second month
Nintendo says it sold more than 280,000 systems last month and 550,000 copies of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
It looks like the Switch is more than a one-hit wonder. Nintendo today announced that the handheld-console hybrid topped the NPD Group's gaming hardware charts for the second straight month in April, while new release Mario Kart 8 Deluxe sold more than half a million units.
Over the course of April, Nintendo sold more than 280,000 Switch units in US. Combined with the 3DS line's 68,000 handhelds sold, Nintendo said its systems accounted for "almost half of all hardware sales" in the US last month.
On the software side, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe launched April 28 and by the end of the reporting period the following day, it had sold 550,000 units in the US. Of those, 460,000 were physical copies sold at retail. Nintendo also praised the performance of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (said to be the NPD's third best-selling game of the month), as well as "strong sales" for other launch day releases 1-2 Switch and Snipperclips.
As for what will drive the system's momentum in the near future, Nintendo is hoping to see returns from the recent Switch launch of Minecraft, the June 16 debut of ARMS, and the July 21 release of Splatoon 2.