TheNintendo Switch 2is the fastest-selling console in history, shipping over 3.5 million consoles in just a couple of days. Despite controversy online about the pricing of the Switch 2 and its games,especially the $80 Mario Kart World, sales have not taken a dent.

Millions of players purchased the Switch 2, but what are they playing on their new system? Well, according to a report fromThe Game Business, they aren’t playing a lot of third-party games. Several third-party games were released on the Switch 2 on its launch day, including Cyberpunk 2077, Hogwarts Legacy, Split Fiction and Civilization 7.

Wario drives the Carpet Flyer outside Shy Guy Bazaar while wearing the Oasis outfit in Mario Kart World.

Nintendo Purists

However, these games have not sold particularly well on the platform, with Nintendo’s first-party games dominating the sales charts. According to the report, 62 per cent of Switch 2 physical game sales in the United States were first-party games (excluding the Mario Kart World bundle); 48 per cent in the United Kingdom on the same metric. If we include the Mario Kart World bundle in the latter metric, then this percentage rises to a whopping 82.

A third-party publisher reportedly told The Game Business that sales were “below our lowest estimates.” Cyberpunk 2077 appears to be somewhat of a success story on the platform, performing the best of third-party releases on the Switch 2.

nintendo-switch-2-tag-page-cover-art_upscayl_1x_ultramix_balanced-1.jpg

It’s still early days in the life cycle of the Switch 2, and players may be unwilling to invest in more games so soon after buying the console with Mario Kart World included. The majority of the third-party games released are also ports, meaning players might own the game on a different platform already. A more telling sign of the potential performance of third-party releases on the Switch 2 will be when a triple-A game releases on the platform at launch, such as Borderlands 4 later this year.

Of course, there’s also the undeniable fact that many players exclusively play first-party games on Nintendo consoles, either abstaining from non-Nintendo releases or simply buying third-party games on other platforms, where performance is likely better.