Super Mario Run’s not-so-super success

The days leading up to the December release of Super Mario Run were full of buzz and excitement about the beloved franchise’s latest iteration. It was widely known that the mobile app would charge $9.99 for full access, one of the heftier price tags as far as mobile gaming is concerned.

Despite that, it seemed that the Mario legacy would be enough to make the game a smashing success. But after Super Mario Run launched on December 15, it became evident that the game was not necessarily going to live up to the hype that preceded the launch or become a craze like Pokémon Go. With only about 4 percent of people that downloaded the game going on to pay the full price in the first three days (December 15–December 17), the vast majority opted to end their game play after the short free experience. The 96 percent that opted to not pay the steep price tag for the game may have been turned off by Super Mario Run and, instead, became negative influencers in the community, further putting out Nintendo’s fire.