Dr. Mario World has the worst first month of any Nintendo mobile title
Cale Michael
Dr. Mario has never been the most popular game, but the release of Dr. Mario World on mobile was supposed to be the perfect fit, pairing the casual style gameplay with the casual audience who game on mobile.
Instead, the doctor had the worst first month of any Nintendo mobile game to date, grossing just $1.4 million per 7.4 million downloads. These numbers are only taken from iOS users, but the numbers probably weren’t much better on Android.
Dr Mario World is Nintendo’s worst performing game to date. Barely breaking the top 500 grossing chart in the US (iOS).
High number of downloads but failure to convert.
Title grossed approx $1m in August 2019. Comp to similar titles in same genre is favorable. pic.twitter.com/McT121tSkw
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) September 2, 2019
Dr. Mario World dominated Nintendo’s mobile game original IP Dragalia Lost in terms of downloads, garnering 7.4 million compared to the other titles 1.6 million. But Dragalia managed to turn a profit of 26 million despite that low download rate, which is likely due to both the type of game and differences in microtransactions.
Dragalia is a Gacha style game where players use in-game currency to collect units to use in battle, while Dr. Mario World’s are instead used to obtain more hearts or unlock rewards. Critics mostly gave the new game fair reviews, but the microtransactions were panned, and it shows in the conversion rate.
Industry analyst Daniel Ahmad points out that despite this initial failure, the game is doing much better than several other games in the same genre. This shows there is still a chance for Dr. Mario to turn things around, but there isn’t much hope for it to become a lucrative success like Dragalia Lost or Fire Emblem Heroes.
Unless something drastic changes, it looks like Nintendo have another game that will roll out as decent and continue to pad along with a dedicated user base and little chance to grow in the future.
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