Nintendo Reveals Mario Kart 8 is The Best Selling Game for June

Written by Brandon Hofer on July 17, 2014

News: One of Nintendo’s popular franchises claims the top spot in the month of June along with hardware sales for both Wii U and 3DS picking up.

Nintendo has revealed that Mario Kart 8 was the top selling SKU in June. The game was the top-selling physical software SKU in the U .S. in June, and sold more than 470,000 physical and digital units. This brings its lifetime total to more than 885,000 units in the U.S. alone. Mario Kart 8 is also driving new momentum for the Wii U platform and its library of great titles, which includes an industry-best 15 games with a Metacritic score of 85 or higher. Sales of hardware and software in June 2014 were up 233 percent and 373 percent, respectively, over June 2013. For the first half of the year, total sales of Wii U hardware and software have increased by 48 percent and 129 percent, respectively, over the same period in 2013.

“These results reinforce the power of the Mario Kart franchise and speak to a bright future for the Wii U platform,” said Scott Moffitt, Nintendo of America’s executive vice president of Sales & Marketing. “History has shown that Mario Kart games tend to have an extremely long tail. We fully expect Mario Kart 8 to continue to drive momentum for our hardware and software business through the holidays and into the foreseeable future.”

It appears the 3DS also had another strong month as well. Hardware sales in June increased by more than 55 percent over sales in May, and Tomodachi Life sold more than 175,000 combined physical and digital units after launching on June 6.

What do you think about these sales numbers? Did you pick up a Wii U to play Mario Kart 8? Did you have one already? Are you waiting for Super Smash Bros? Tell us what you think below.