Nintendo's refusal to have a Nintendo Selects/Players Choice line of video games this generation.  They weren't games I needed to play but if they were somewhere in the $20-$30 price range I may have impulsed bought them.

I thought Zelda Tears of the Kindgom would have surpassed Super Mario Party by now

Ps2 isnt going to be king of console sales verry soon.

I was expecting 1.8-2m Switch shipments so this is a pretty decent start to the fiscal year. It'll have to remain basically completely flat for the other three quarters to reach 13.5m which I really don't see happening but even just 10-11m would still be a great result for its age. The software forecast is also looking tough to reach since there isn't much room left for declines with that already being down 22m but the declines in the other quarters shouldn't be anywhere near as bad so if they miss it it shouldn't be by that much.

Something noteworthy about the software is how much the digital ratio has increased YoY and how close it's getting to two thirds. It's gonna start at about that level with the Switch 2 or reach it quickly so this was the console where digital for Nintendo went from a low percentage to the majority and that'll be the console for them where it starts fully taking over and by the end of it physical will not have much relevance left which is gonna make things like the software sales from Famitsu increasingly become less useful.

Also this is a pretty disappointing start for the TTYD remake with its first quarter sales being a lot lower than Origami King and the Super Mario RPG remake. With how quickly these games fall off it might only barely reach 2m which isn't exactly a great result for pushing the series to return to its roots. Perhaps three Mario RPG's releasing in a year span is gonna hurt the latter two due to sales being cannibalized.

For the digital ratio, you gotta take into account that this is the proportional rate for all sold software anyway and the lack of big releases that would usually favor the physical market have been absent this quarter, therefore not representive of the usual growth.

The presence of bigger software pieces during Q3 will probably even this out.

That's true though FY24 Q4 was also up in that regard compared to FY23 Q4 so the trend is still clear. The last ever quarter where the digital ratio is below 50% can't be far off now.

The trend is here, but my main point is the growth that occured this quarter is non-reprensatative of the usual trend.

Anyway, considering the gargantuan volume of software in physical alone this generation. Physical is not going anywhere for the next Switch sucessor.

Heck, they're even selling a physical option with Emio while the previous duo remakes had none appart from a limited collection. There's value in it. 

I know, to be more clear my point with pointing out the increase was due to it being noteworthy cause of how unusually large it is. It won't be going anywhere for the Switch 2 of course though I do think it's possible that by the early 2030's it'll have declined by so much that there's at least a small chance they forgo it for the following system. If not then I'd bet on that system being the last ever major console to have it.

It's important to note that the mentioned 58.9% Digital sales includes revenue of NSO subsriptions and DLC and is not just the digital software portion of Nintendo published games only.

Source Page 20: https://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/pdf/2024/240802_2e.pdf

The second box top row shows the Proportion of Digital sales of total Software sales as 58.9%. The Third box top row shows how much of that was digital versions of packaged Nintendo published software at 42.2%.

Given their own calculation method:

Digital Sales: Includes (a) downloadable version of packaged software (the downloadable version of software that is offered both physically and digitally), (b) download-only software, (C) add-on content and (d) Nintendo Switch Online, etc.
・Proportion of Digital Sales: Proportion of digital sales to total dedicated video game platform software sales
・Proportion of Downloadable Versions of Packaged Software Sales: Proportion of downloadable versions of packaged software sales to total digital sales [= a/(a+b+c+d)]

That means 42.2% of 58.9% of sales where digital sales of also available as packaged software. Or in other words 24.86% according to my understanding.

ps. Any digital portion of non-Nintendo published games cannot be determined, because this report only talks about Nintendo revenue.

If you take out tears of the kingdom that 22 million number almost disappears. It is a deficit but the deficit was cause by the largest first party game released that year that year, nintendo should be able to close that gap with zelda, mario party