^ this. 
Thread question is a odd one to me.

I agree, I don't think it was a flop in any way. I just wanted to know what the general opinion is.

Didnt Nintendo say Breath of the Wild needed to sell 2m to break even?

If BOTW breaks even at 2m than ARMS would be very profitable at that number.

From official breakdowns, we know $34 of ever $60 game goes to the publisher if that publisher is also the platform holder. And ARMS has had no price cuts or sales that lasted for significant periods during its major sales periods. So that means at 1.67 million sold, the game made 50 million+. That's assuming all retail. Which it isn't, so it is somewhat higher.
So you tell me, do you think ARMS cost that much to make? I'm going to go out on a limb here and say...no.

Considering what the game looks and plays like, I don't imagine development costs were very high. It'd most likely broken even well before 1m, so it's not like it hurt Nintendo.

That said, I'm sure the team could have been put to better use on something higher quality to make more money.

Nintendo recently had ARMS on sale for 30% off on the Eshop.

i was interested in ARMS but compared to every other game that came out for the Switch in 2017 (BotW, Odyssey, Splatoon 2, Mario Kart 8 DX) it just didnt capture my attention enough to pick it up, and now i feel like ive missed the hype train. i have little desire to pick it up now because any form of a fanbase that could have formed out of ARMS is already there. comparatively - i picked up the original Splatoon on day 1, and what really made that first month more exciting than anything was getting to be one of the first to try out this new game concept. people made mistakes, experimented with different weapons, uncovered the game's hidden lore, developed their own strategies, and i got to be a part of it. but ARMS has been out for over a yea now, so i wont get to be a part of that this time around. i would be playing catch-up, and probably just end up playing standard online matches for a few weeks until i get bored with it. and i really do think that is what stopped it from being a smash it, its a good game, just not as good everything else. kind of a "wrong place at the wrong time" scenario

Definitely not. It still outsold most of fighting games this gen.

Since they are still continuing support with it into holding their own tournaments. Im sure Nintendo was happy with it.

Nice to see them tackling a genre and putting their own spin into it.

I don't think it was a flop, if those sales constitute a flop then Nintendo put too much money into it.