List of Nintendo franchises

This is a list of video game franchises published by Nintendo. There have been multiple Nintendo-developed or Nintendo-published video games that have turned into series with two or more entries.[1][2] Other franchises are jointly owned by Nintendo, which they continue to publish games in their respective series. This includes the Kirby series, owned by Nintendo and HAL Laboratory,[3] and the Pokémon video game series, a franchise owned by Nintendo, Game Freak, and Creatures.[4] Some franchises are associated with Nintendo, but are not always published as Nintendo franchises. Series such as Bayonetta are exclusive to Nintendo platforms through licensing agreements, with the intellectual property being owned by Sega.[5] Other series such as Cruis'n, although owned by Nintendo, are often not published as Nintendo products, being associated more closely with Midway Games and Raw Thrills.[6] New franchises are often created at the beginning of a console's lifespan as experimental titles, with one of the most recent successful Nintendo series being Splatoon.[7][8] When creating new video games at Nintendo, gameplay mechanics are conceptualized first, with a pre-established franchise chosen to best fit the desired game, otherwise creating a new franchise to suit the gameplay.[9] Some of Nintendo's franchises have sold over 100 million copies total, including The Legend of Zelda series, the Wii series, and the Pokémon series. With over 763 million copies sold as of 2025, their largest video game franchise is Mario.[10] Nintendo has also created some of the longest-running video game franchises, with the first Game & Watch handheld system created in 1980,[11] and Donkey Kong created in 1981.[12]

List of Nintendo video game franchises

See also

• List of video game franchises
• List of Sega video game franchises