@Heavyarms55 As much of fan of F-Zero as I am, I think it’s important to be realistic about how big it actually is/was. GX (the last major home console entry in the series) is one of my favourite racers of all time. But here is the list best-selling GCN titles in Japan. GX is there but it takes an alarming amount of scrolling to find. Sticking with Japan, Splat2 has at the time of writing sold over 3.1 million copies in the region, making it over 30 times more popular than GX on its home turf.

Of course, we’re comparing a game that Japan has gone particularly crazy for against one that it seemed to blind eye to, but taking a more global view (and assuming the figure pulled from and old interview in Edge is correct), then we have 1.5 million for GX vs. 9 million for Splat2, which is still six times more.

Looking at Nintendo’s official sales figures for Switch games you can see that alongside the predicable behemoth franchises of Mario, Zelda, and Pokemon - all stalwarts with over 20 years of history apiece - sits the relatively fresh faced Splatoon. Even on the Smash cover, Inkling Girl is up front and centre. Aside from 1-2 Switch (which isn’t really a franchise), and Smash (which is like, every franchise), no other franchise even gets a look-in. And Nintendo has a fair few franchises on the Switch.

So yeah, Splatoon is not only excellent, but also a commercial success, and I can only feel optimistic about its future! I’m sure it’ll stay fresh for many years to come.