Board 8 > Current state of Nintendo franchises

(+) Yeah! (+)

Input welcomed/encouraged. I did not include IPs with only one entry (like ARMS).

AAA - system sellers
Mario platformers
Zelda
Pokemon
Mario Kart
Super Smash Bros.

AA - unit pushers
Animal Crossing
Splatoon

A - Frequent, heavily-promoted, high-selling games
Fire Emblem
Kirby
Xenoblade

B - Infrequent, but heavily-promoted and high-selling games
Metroid
Donkey Kong
Yoshi

C - alive
Mario spinoffs (Sports, Party, RPGs, etc)
Style Savvy

D - on life support
Pikmin
WarioWare
Star Fox

E - dormant
Punch-Out
Kid Icarus
F-Zero
Chibi Robo
Pilotwings

F - functionally dead, some legacy representation
Mother
Wii ___
Game & Watch

G - functionally dead, little to no legacy representation
___ Wars
Golden Sun
Custom Robo
Brain Age
Fossil Fighters
Starfy
Hotel Dusk
Star Tropics

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Only one I would disagree with is Metroid. It has the pedigree, but not the sales. For comparison, DK Tropical Freeze sold 2 million on the Wii U alone versus the half a million sold by Samus Returns. And outside of SR and Federation Force, Samus has been in cryosleep the whole decade.

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I don't know much about Splatoon but it looks like the kind of series Nintendo will abandon real quick so I feel it's position there is super tentative.

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pjbasis posted...

I don't know much about Splatoon but it looks like the kind of series Nintendo will abandon real quick so I feel it's position there is super tentative.

It could be but right now it's definitely there. They are still pushing and promoting it up there with their big names and heavy hitters.

Actually now that I think about it, wasn't there a downloadable Fossil Fighters game a couple years ago? Maybe it belongs in the E tier.

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pjbasis posted...

I don't know much about Splatoon but it looks like the kind of series Nintendo will abandon real quick so I feel it's position there is super tentative.

both games sold super well, I dont know why Nintendo would abandon it

but also I think itll be an infrequent release. Maybe not all the way until the next console, but at least another two or three years.

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poor rhythm heaven. Easily the best Nintendo IP but no one even knows it exists

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F-Zero is closer to dead than dormant

If it weren't Captain Falcon in Smash it'd be in the absolute bottom tier at this point

And based on my Facebook feed Animal Crossing might very well be in the top tier at this point, if wasn't already there with New Leaf

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DeepsPraw posted...

poor rhythm heaven. Easily the best Nintendo IP but no one even knows it exists

Ah yes, my bad. There are plenty of other franchises I forgot to put in the bottom two tiers, sure.

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Animal Crossing is absolutely in the AAA tier now. New Horizons just posted the third biggest Nintendo launch ever in the US (behind only Brawl and Ultimate), biggest Switch launch in the UK, and possibly the biggest launch for any game in Japan depending on digital. Its enormous.

I would also push Donkey Kong and Pikmin up one. Donkey Kong gets stuff, just not main games, and is a big seller. Pikmin sells well and had a game less than three years ago, as well as 4 being in development (for five years...).

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I think Animal Crossing is probably a system seller to a lot of people.

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Also they put out a Brain Age game four months ago. Its alive. That and Rhythm Heaven should be C tier.

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rhythm heaven is life support at the highest. maybe move Wario up a spot. WW Gold came out recently and was good

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Underleveled posted...

G - functionally dead, little to no legacy representation
Hotel Dusk

This makes me very sad.

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Lightning Strikes posted...

Animal Crossing is absolutely in the AAA tier now. New Horizons just posted the third biggest Nintendo launch ever in the US (behind only Brawl and Ultimate), biggest Switch launch in the UK, and possibly the biggest launch for any game in Japan depending on digital. Its enormous.

Yep, New Horizons' debut week saw the single best selling week of Switches ever in Japan, and in the US there were more Switches sold in March 2020 than in March 2017 (launch month).

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I would bump Mario Kart and Metroid down a tier.

Nobody buys a system solely to play Mario Kart, and Metroid hasn't been a sales force in well over a decade.

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no way does Mario Kart get bumped down

Metroid though, sad as it is to say as one of my favourite franchises, has never been in these leagues

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You say that, but Mario Kart alone has total sales above the entire Sonic series and just a few mil shy of the entire Final Fantasy series.

That thing moves consoles

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I only bought a Wii U to play MK8.

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Does it move consoles or do consoles move it?

Regardless it's a top tier series.

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what was your criteria for dormant vs dead? asking for pilotwings vs fossil fighters

does yokai watch count?

NES remix?

paper mario? :( EDIT: missed RPGs

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GTM posted...

does yokai watch count?

Not a Nintendo franchise.

Also the franchise is cratering in Japan anyway.

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Yeah, F-Zero should be F tier, with Captain Falcon in Smash being the only thing keeping it out of G.
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technically Brain Age is still alive in Japan

*edit* wait what, the Switch game also got released in EU&Australia?.... why no furtherrr

*edit2* wait whaaaaaaaaat, it also has an official Nintendo Switch stylus accessory?! Mario Maker needs that localized yo T_T

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Clubhouse Games probably gets moved to C with the Switch game coming out.

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plasmabeam posted...

I would bump Mario Kart down a tier.

3rd highest selling DS game behind New Super Mario Bros. and the three Nintendogs games combined
Highest selling Wii game Wii Sports actually crushes it but that was bundled so it doesn't count
Highest selling 3DS game
Highest selling WiiU game
Highest selling Switch game

It's absolutely a AAA franchise

Yeah I dont see how F-Zero isnt in the same tier as Mother
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I'd bump Splatoon down one. Popular, sure, but I'd say it maxes out at around Fire Emblem/Kirby level at the absolute most

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Johnbobb posted...

I'd bump Splatoon down one. Popular, sure, but I'd say it maxes out at around Fire Emblem/Kirby level at the absolute most

Splatoon has already sold more than the entire Fire Emblem franchise with two games

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The only thing that could be bumped down from the AAA is Zelda, because it was only BotW that brought it back up there for a while.

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Nintendo does love to spam F-Zero in all their retro free game shit so it still has that kind of relevance I think.

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There was a Brain Age game a few months ago. Nobody really cares about the franchise anymore, it wasn't released in all regions and I don't think it did well, but it still happened so I think that puts it more in "life support" category than actually dead.

A few missing ones on the list:

-Art Academy, which went from almost yearly releases to no games since 2016. There's enough chance of revival that I'd rank it as dormant.

-Boxboy! which is alive but not exactly a major franchise.

-Excite as in Excitebike and Excite Truck, which is looking pretty dead but gets some legacy representation through Mario Kart and Smash Bros references.

-Fluidity is dead and barely remembered.

-Nintendogs did well enough and is referenced frequently enough in other products that I think it's dormant and likely to return, possibly in mobile game form as it seems well-suited for the medium.

-Labo is alive, having received the VR kit only about a year ago. I wouldn't be surprised to see another Labo set or two on the Switch. Given the concept is built around the hardware though, I don't think it will survive past the Switch's life cycle.

-Puzzle League isn't looking too healthy at the moment, but will likely return in some form eventually. I'd call it dormant.

-Pokemon spin-offs (Detective Pikachu, Pokken Tournament, Mystery Dungeon etc.) aren't going anywhere soon. They're very much alive.

-Pushmo seems likely to remain in the 3DS era, but I wouldn't be completely shocked if it returned. Not sure whether to call it dormant or functionally dead.

-R.O.B. is almost definitely dead, but continues to make cameos and be playable in Smash Bros.

-Rhythm Heaven got a game as recently as 2015 and is basically in the same lifeboat as Warioware in the dormant category.

-Sin and Punishment is dead and mostly forgotten. Treasure doesn't seem to be around anymore and the demand is pretty low, meaning future S&P games are very unlikely.

-Steel Diver had a sequel apparently, which is news to me but makes it a franchise technically. The franchise has maybe 10 fans in the entire world and will likely stay dead.

-Wave Race doesn't have nearly as much fan demand as F-Zero and lacks any memorable characters or locations to really capitalize on. It's dead.

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Underleveled posted...

Input welcomed/encouraged. I did not include IPs with only one entry (like ARMS).

A - Frequent, heavily-promoted, high-selling games
Fire Emblem
Kirby
Xenoblade

I would say FE definitely belongs to a "unit pushers" tier. Xenoblade too (main reason I decided to get switch), but maybe to a lesser extent.

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Overall Metroid is in the right tier, but over the past decade ouch. Though you have two weird experimental titles and a remake on an aging system, so we'll just have to wait until Prime 4 hits. Which I'm now anticipating more than I was.

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Picross
Ken Griffey Jr Baseball
Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games

Where do they fit

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Yeah F-Zero is above stuff like Mother because stuff from it still gets crammed into other stuff. Besides Falcon in Smash, you have the Blue Falcon and now a track as well in Mario Kart, it had a mini game in Nintendo Land, and so on.

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I would have agreed with Animal Crossing's position had New Horizons not done as well as it did. Definitely AA now IMO.

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Even before New Horizon it was probably already AAA, the last two games broke 10 million each

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HashtagSEP posted...

Yeah F-Zero is above stuff like Mother because stuff from it still gets crammed into other stuff. Besides Falcon in Smash, you have the Blue Falcon and now a track as well in Mario Kart, it had a mini game in Nintendo Land, and so on.

That counts as legacy representation

The series itself is dead as a doorknob

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Animal crossing even on the 3ds was in the AAA tier. The audience there is something like 60% female and they buy it just for that. It's unique in their library and basically took what Nintendogs did on the DS and is more extreme.

I'd bump Metroid down one because the last few entries weren't any good. Prime series is one thing but the last 2D one with praise was on the GBA. Hunters? That soccer one? They didn't do shit.

Similarly I'd bump up Mario spinoffs to either A or B. It's infrequent if it's by series but collectively it's high.

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Splatoon is kind of its own thing right now. Can go either direction, fair to be in the middle.

The Switch game is gonna break 8 figures. Nothing below can do that.

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MechanicalWall posted...

That counts as legacy representation

The series itself is dead as a doorknob

Eh, then I feel like there needs to be more tiers. There should be a difference between something that only appears in Smash or VC and something that still fairly commonly gets referenced in other games outside of Smash.

EDIT: Like, if F-Zero gets bumped down, then Mother needs bumped down even further.

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Animal Crossing is top-tier for sure. Moreso than Zelda.

Yoshi is just as frequent as the others in the frequent tier.

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F tier might as well be Smash tier. Which F-Zero basically belongs to but so does Mother.

... Pikmin should probably be down a tier too honestly. It had Wii U ports and is also Smash tier, "alive" sums it up.

We need more __Wars games.

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FFDragon posted...

You say that, but Mario Kart alone has total sales above the entire Sonic series and just a few mil shy of the entire Final Fantasy series.

That thing moves consoles

Mario Kart is the game you buy after the Mario/Zelda/Pokemon/Smash game you primarily bought the console for. All those different audiences enjoy MK, which is why it sells so well.

It's like french fries at a fast food restaurant. Whether you order a burger or chicken nuggets, there's a very good chance you'll take a side of fries.

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I've never even heard of Fossil Fighters in my life.

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Animal Crossing is AAA. ALso it's a fuckin disgrace that fire emblem is bigger than Metroid. At least it is not bigger han DK

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plasmabeam posted...

Mario Kart is the game you buy after the Mario/Zelda/Pokemon/Smash game you primarily bought the console for. All those different audiences enjoy MK, which is why it sells so well.

It's like french fries at a fast food restaurant. Whether you order a burger or chicken nuggets, there's a very good chance you'll take a side of fries.

For more casual audiences, it's a console seller. For families that only buy one console, Mario Kart makes the difference.

And sales absolutely matters. I think it has outsold the other top franchises on every console since GBA or Gamecube. Maybe NSMB beat MKDS, but that changes nothing.

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TomNook posted...

I've never even heard of Fossil Fighters in my life.

don't talk to sep much do ya

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fossil fighters is a pokemon knockoff.
which is weird that it's by nintendo but hey.

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TomNook posted...

I've never even heard of Fossil Fighters in my life.

But if you've never heard of Fossil Fighters, how could you possibly

FIND the fossils,
COLLECT the bones,
BATTLE with dinosaurs!

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