A lot of people are talking about the impending showdown between the PlayStation 5 and the Xbox Series X this holiday season, as both systems will try to win over the audience during that crucial first Christmas sales period. There is another war brewing on the Nintendo side of things, as Animal Crossing: New Horizons has become the first game to threaten Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's title as the bไest-sellinওg Switch game of all time.
Nintendo recently announced that 61.44 million Switch consoles have been sold as of the end of June. The current best-selling Switch game is Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, which has held the title for almost three years now. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has sold 26.74 million units to date, which means that over a third of Switch owners possess the game. This is an incredibly high attach rate, but it's not a surprising one, considering how universal the appeal of a Mario Kart game is. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is jam-packed with content and it has refined a gameplay style that never gets old. It's no surprise that Mario Kart 8 Deluxe rarely leaves the sales ܫch👍arts, as it's practically an essential purchase for new Switch owners.
A few games seemed as if they could threaten Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's dominance, such as Pokémon Sword & Shield or Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, but they just haven't been able to keep up. Everything changed in 2020, however, when the Nook nation attacked. Animal Crossing: New Horizons was expected to be Nintendo's biggest game of 2020, but no one could have anticipated just how big it would be. According to Nintendo's latest financial report, Animal Crossing: New Horizons has sold 22.40 million units, putting it within spitting distance of taking Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's crown.
The most surprising thing about the rise of Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the timescale involved. Animal Crossing: New Horizons was released at the end of March, and it has almost caught up to the sales figures that Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has been building since 2017. There is no denying that COVID-19 played a huge role in this, as the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons almost coincided with the lockdown enforced in many nations. People around the world found themselves with a lot of free time on their hands, at a time when Animal Crossing: New Horizons was being talked about all over social media. This perfect storm of events has led to Animal Crossing going from one of Nintendo's oddball franchises into the kind of series that can compete with the likes of Pokémon and Super Smash Bros. in terms of grabbing headlines.
The battle lines have been drawn between Mario and Tom Nook. The top three best-selling Nintendo Switch games now boast characters from Animal Crossing, which is something that Super Mario Bros., Pokémon, and The Legend of Zelda cannot say. One of the most important holiday seasons in gaming history is coming up, and plenty of people might be turned off by the prices of the next-gen systems, assuming Microsoft and Sony ever bother to reveal them. The Nintendo Switch has a chance to clean up this holiday season, and it will be interesting to see whether Animal Crossing: New Horizons will dethrone Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, or whether the Ital෴ian plumber will keep his grip o𒁏n the title, once the fervor surrounding his competitor dies down.