Nintendo LABO has only sold 1 million units since release. The Curse of the Cardboard?

It was released in April 2018. Should we be expecting better sales for these pizza boxes? PSVR, which people said would completely flop, is nearing 4 million sold, and has/had a price tag of $250-$400.

If PSVR is a flop, what does that make LABO?

https://variety.com/2019/gaming/news/nintendo-labo-sales-2018-1203125619/

https://nintendoeverything.com/nintendo-on-evergreen-switch-software-labos-performance/

WITNESS ME

Rare look at how Nintendo's online servers actually work:

PSVR > Labo

Who said PSVR was a flop? ? Anyway, it's no secret that the LABO sales didn't meet Nintendo's expectations. But considering how much skepticism and ridicule it received from the start, 1 million ain't too bad.

Seems they're trying to remarket it as an educational tool in schools now, so more power to them.

Funny GIF captions though, gotta give you that haha.

A million people bought a piece of cardboard?

That's insane! How did Nintendo get people that far?

Huh... the way it's promoted with new editions continually being released, I would have thought it sold better.

1 million too many if you ask me.

I mean seriously, did Nintendo think a peace of cardboard would be a hot seller, lol. I'm surprised this flop sold 1 million, tbh.

Nothing that sells more than a million copies is a "complete flop" in my opinion of course, especially at the elevated price point. There is a huge gaping space between "complete flop" and "lights the whole world on fire and utterly dominates the industry". Not everything is either the best thing ever or the worst thing ever but still, LABO was a Gimmick and nothing more/less.

Edit: The same goes to PSVR, it sold over a million and that too isn't a flop.

Yep. But alas, gamer logic never fails. These are children who know nothing about how the world works.

For how much those things cost that actually a lot of sales.

@vfighter: Exactly it's freaking cardboard, since it is so cheap the amount of profit made on each labo sold is a lot of money.

Pretty sure that it didn't flop. People says it flop if it doesn't meet expectation....just like BLOPS4. It made $500 million, but not enough. Does that mean it flopped?

Well, I thought it was very creative and I for one appreciated them taking mankind a step forwards in terms of digital manuals (though it should let you skip steps entirely if you want to).

"Curse of the Cardboard" made me chuckle.

I guess you really can sell ice to Eskimos.

How embarrassing.

£70 cardboard. LOL. People were hyping this and defending it. It really is Nintendo's answer to VR.

this shit sold 1M? lol

i could go to my local supermarket, get empty cardboard boxes and make this crap myself for free lulz

That's incredible dude, could you program the software yourself too?

Lol, bravo with the nintendo online.

Surprised labo hit one million be interesting to hear who's actually still got the cardboard and not been accidentally thrown in trash.

LABO sold a glorified mini game wrapped with cardboard for $70. I think it's safe to say they made a profit despite it's a Gimmick.

When you think about it, Nintendo has what, $4 Billion and even if this didn't reach over $1 million, Nintendo has nothing to lose, but Sony does if they aren't careful how to not waste money.

lol, what? Sony is like 4 times bigger of a company than Nintendo.

LMAO! Nintendo's gonna try to sell off all their recyclables to their fans.

Dumbo Nintendo. What's next Plastic Labo lol

i have to agree. if it was this or vr i would have chose vr. :P

You know, I always appreciate Nintendo's approach to design, how they try to make things tangible and real world, really make things present and try to incorporate a social aspect (a real, in-person social aspect) to it.

But this was just, I don't know...lame.

TBH I am shocked it sold that much. Good for them.

Suggesting that a bunch of video game nerds want to play with cardboard isn't gonna fly. A weird Nintendo decision in the midst of a successful run.

See with Nintendo though, they'd rather take a chance on something odd than pump yearly FPS games down your throat. I can respect that, but it doesn't always hit the mark. Labo just weird.

The only people here who care are trolls who think that Nintendo fans care.

I think this could have been the best product Nintendo ever made.

I'm not really sure what it is even now after watching the 'What is Nintendo Labo?' video https://labo.nintendo.com. I think it's making housings for the wiimote or something then pretending it's a steering wheel or flight stick.

I think I was expecting Meccano but it turned out to be origami.

This a a huge missed opportunity because if Nintendo made it programmable with a simple language - some kids have no problem learning coding if it's explained and actually really enjoy it. With modular components it could have taken the world by storm as a product.

I'm thinking a real life minecraft with redstone, switches and pistons.

My Primary school still has, 20 years after me leaving, just the one programmable rover thing to teach angles or something, for it's high tech learning, in fact, it's just a smaller version of the one we weren't allowed to touch when I was there. Just two programmable electric motors in a plastic dome, each wheel controlled independently. There was a robotics event (below) but I think programming needs to be taught more in schools.

I can see why Nintendo used cardboard, having thought about it a bit. If they want to sell to 5 year olds, using metal would have resulted in too many injuries and honestly, using plastic would be a dick move, environmentally speaking.

So people turn their noses up because cardboard is such an out of date technology but it's better than metal or plastic (in this case) and If it's coated it shouldn't go soggy if it gets wet.

Really a raspberry pi would be much more interesting to most kids though.

It just proves that Nintendo fanboys will buy ANY trash as long as it has a Nintendo logo on it.

Imagine if Nintendo make a cardboard master sword? The fanboys would have went ape-ish and bought 10 million of the damn things.

@ajstyles: Was wondering when you would show up.

Marketing, Nintendo.

There is a sales floor for just about anything if you market it enough.

I doubt this was particularly "risky" considering it's a low budget game combined with cardboard kit. Small dev costs. Risky is when developers commit to something big. This seems more like a "spaghetti against wall" strategy. Spaghetti is cheap.

The riskiest thing was probably figuring out how many to produce. How to get store to stock them on their shelves as they take a bit of space. But Nintendo is generally conservative about such things. So it's not like they were going to produce 10 million and be stuck with 9 million of them. Instead, they probably only produced barely more than 1 or 2 million and if it had turned into some sort of hit, then people just wouldn't be able to get them (or have to wait awhile).

It got nintendo slapped on to it so it sells 1m. If this was some random devs I think it would struggle to hit even 50k

@sakaixx: It's still a quality product. If all to took for something to sell well was a big company slapping their brand on it then the PS Classic would be flying off the shelves now.

well they got them for 40$ when on sale now more likely a clearance get rid of them. not many want pay 79$ for card board im sorry

@mandzilla: Its hard to gauge if its nintendo, their fanbase is more inclined to buy compared to other console publishers. I compare them to apple fan in term of buying pattern, its a complement to nintendo to have such fanbase.

They sold one million CARDBOARD kits. I do not see the appeal, but Jesus, i'd struggle to call selling a million pieces of cardboard a flop. Even with the software, the profit margin must be pretty damn solid on those things.

One million sold for a pack of cardboards is impressive. I was thinking it sold about 50k.

I don't understand people's negative obsession with this. It's a really cool idea. Like, really cool (for nerds and creative types). I used to have chemistry sets, electronics kits, and made robots any chance I could, be it with legos, wiring up roaches to microcomputers, or standalone programmable kits. I would have loved the sh*t out of this as a kid.

I don't even hate LABO myself. I know it's not targeting for me, it's somebody else it's targeting for. If LABO was able to sell over $1 million, it's doing something and maybe not alot but I take it as better then nothing.

I'm not gonna lie, it looks cool on paper, but playing it today's standard looks silly if you ask me. If this thing was made in the 90's, I would be the coolest kid in my neighborhood lol :P

@xantufrog: I am negative about this because Nintendo’s rabid fan base will buy anything Nintendo makes despite the poor quality.

It sends the wrong message to Nintendo when their fans will buy anything. It means Nintendo doesn’t have to try at all because their fans are easy to please.

Miyamoto could poop in a box and sell it for $10,000 and one of the fanboys would buy it.

I can’t stand people who settle for less. You should be angry Nintendo makes trash cardboard. Not go along with it, spend $100 on it and pretend you are having fun.

But whatever bro. Something something fool and money are soon departed. :P

I think Nintendo's goal with the Labo thing was to experiment with a new type of gaming concept, and see how people responded. Nintendo has tried for years to expand the idea of what a video game can be, and I think maybe they were looking at Labo as a relatively affordable way (for those who already own a Switch) to get people interested in how things work.

Did I think it was stupid? Yeah. Did it meet expectations? I sorta doubt it. But I think Nintendo is looking at games from the perspective of, "What can this technology be used for, in fun ways, besides gaming as is?"

I don't see the appeal ... then again i'm in my early 30's so that's probably why.

With that being said, i think the product does have a market for little kids so it doesn't surprise me that they have sold 1million copies.

Was it a failure ??? maybe ... but at the same time, i don't think Nintendo was planning this to sell in the millions.

Last I checked...Nintendo's direct competitors, Sony and Microsoft, have never "pumped out yearly FPS games".

Weird flex but ok.

He did not recognize

@ajstyles: your reply is predecated on the idea that this is objectively a worthless trash idea. Now, I'm not going to convince you otherwise, I'm sure, but my comment was based on my completely different opinion that this is a cool idea. So... Maybe we just have different tastes

Yeah when it was first revealed I was not impressed by the concept and won't ever be buying one. Lol

Well that's not always the case, look at LABO. Switch owners knew what they were getting with that product, and clearly it wasn't for everyone since it only topped a million sales.

Compared with the other console publishers, I guess Nintendo is at a bit of an advantage in that they've been around longer and have more iconic game characters to drive sales. I'm sure if Sony or Microsoft had existed for decades in the gaming business they'd have a similar legacy appeal. Not to mention, Nintendo has managed to build up customer loyalty over the years by putting out quality software. For the most part you know you're buying something good.