Splatoon is Nintendo’s first major in house new IP in over a decade, and it is also a very fresh new spin on the shooter genre. Players have been awaiting its launch for a while now, and Nintendo itself has also been giving the game all of its marketing push. And the result of that seems to be, the game has sold. Like, a lot. More than Nintendo was expecting. As a matter of fact, it appears that the game has completely sold out in Japan, and that there are shortages, to the point that Nintendo has had to issue an apology and promise to deliver more stock soon.
“We would like to apologize for Spatoon’s shortages in retail stores,” Nintendo said. “We plan on replenishing the stock next week with a new shipment, but if you wish to play the game now, please consider buying the game off of the Nintendo eShop, where it is available digitally. We would also like to assure you that the Splatoon Amiibos, which are in short supply, will be seeing more production runs soon too.”
So, it sounds like Nintendo’s newest game is, in spite of all of its problems, a hit. Whether or not it continues with this level of success remains to be seen, but we will keep you posted. Stay tuned for our Splatoon review as well.