Nintendo says Mario Kart World is a “crucial” game, aims to convey appeal so that it’s “embraced by a wide audience as a perennial staple in our lineup”

During the Q&A portion of Nintendo’s financial results briefing, one investor brought up how Mario Kart World’s sales momentum seems to have decreased since the discontinuation of hardware bundles. President Shuntaro Furukawa was asked about the reasons behind this.

It’s worth noting that Mario Kart World is still the best-selling Nintendo Switch 2 game by far. Since launch, it has sold 14.70 million copies. The next closest is Donkey Kong Bananza at 4.52 million.

We have the following comments from Furukawa (via machine translation):

“While I must refrain from disclosing detailed sales figures for specific individual titles, Mario Kart World is a crucial title that we intend to continue selling over the entire lifecycle of the Nintendo Switch 2. We remain committed to conveying its appeal to consumers and aim to ensure it continues to be embraced by a wide audience as a perennial staple in our lineup.”

Aside from the above, Furukawa weighed in on software sales in general. Right now Nintendo is forecasting 60 million games sold for the coming fiscal year.”

Furukawa told the investor:

“Regarding software, we believe the key lies not merely in the sales of Nintendo Switch 2 software in isolation, but rather in how we strategically develop our overall software business across both the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 platforms.

It is important to note that our actual software sales figures for the previous fiscal year included units sold as part of hardware bundles; conversely, our sales forecast for the current fiscal year excludes units sold in such bundles. Based on this premise – and looking at the combined figures for both the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 – our software sales forecast for the current fiscal year has been set at a level roughly comparable to the previous fiscal year’s actual results, once those bundled units are excluded.”

In case you missed it, Furukawa also discussed Nintendo Switch 2’s strong first-year sales. He also talked about the system’s performance in the west and the software lineup.