Obscurity, much?/Nintendo

Nintendo is notorious for releasing popular game franchises such as *Super Mario Bros.*, *Kirby*, *Pokémon* and *Metroid*. But for every game franchise they create that is popular, they make more that are cult classics *at best*.

A few restrictions on this page:

* Being pulled from the Nintendo eShop doesn't automatically make a title a candidate for this trope. Nor is a console instantly obscure just because its own online store was shuttered. There needs to be evidence that the game or console in question didn't have a lot of players prior to the game being pulled or the console's web store being sunset.
* Nintendo's been around a long time (since *1889*, in fact), so only examples from the Color TV Game onward should be documented.
* With the exception of legacy examples (documented before January 1st, 2023), only games that have been out for at least two months (or consoles that have been discontinued) can be documented.

*Pokémon* had so many spin-off games and related merchandise fall under this trope, it got its own page.

## Consoles/peripherals

* The Nintendo DSi Shop. Ever since the Nintendo 3DS' own eShop came out, the Nintendo DSi Shop kept getting more and more obscure, leading to its only use being to get the transfer tool if you want to transfer your DSiWare onto your 3DS. Bad news? The only piece of software the 3DS *couldn't* accept was the original Flipnote Studio (an understandable move, as Nintendo released a successor app called *Flipnote Studio 3D*). Eventually Nintendo took notice of the DSi Shop's obscurity and discontinued it. In Australia. And did the same thing for North America's DSi Shop right on the day before April Fools' Day 2017. Which makes a DSi that you just bought pretty much useless as of 2016. Nintendo's still allowing people to download DSiWare through the 3DS' eShop, but...
* The Nintendo 64DD is semi-obscure outside Japan, since it wasn't officially released outside Japan. It was planned for an American release, but the GameCube was on its way and Nintendo didn't want to risk low sales while people waited for the GameCube.
* While it's still possible to play Nintendo GameCube games (some videogame stores still sell GameCube games, usually in pre-played condition), its e-Reader accessory is semi-obscure at best. Copies of the peripheral go for around $18 *used* online. The few games that mention it include, but are not limited to, Animal Crossing and Pokémon Channel.
* The Virtual Boy in Europe. You're probably wondering, "How could a console released in Japan and North America that got a lot of bad publicity and was deemed one of Nintendo's biggest follies be obscure in a place like Europe?" Said bad publicity was the reason why the console never even *received* an European release.
	+ There were only 14 games released in North America. That's how big of a failure (it wasn't semi-obscure at the time of its release) the Virtual Boy was.
* Contrary to popular belief, the Game Boy averted this and went on to become a staple of discussions about Nintendo's history with handheld gaming.
	+ Though some of the system's third-party games and peripherals are semi-obscure at best.
	+ Its successor, the Game Boy Advance, fell into this. Out of the various models, only the original and SP models are talked about when referring to a GBA. The Micros are usually only found at used game shops or eBay (some may be on Amazon if you're lucky, but most won't be cheap), but the DVD player that allowed you to play GBA games is completely obscure.
		- The original Nintendo DS and DS Lite models, which avert this, still allowed GBA gameplay, only for Nintendo to ditch GBA backwards-compatibility for the DSi. Nintendo's Ambassadors program offered 3DS "Ambassadors" (people who paid the original launch price) ten free GBA games as an "apology" of sorts.

## Individual games/game series

* *Was* supposed to be the case with Fire Emblem in North America. Had Super Smash Bros. Melee's Western localization dummied out Marth and Roy, *Fire Emblem* would have had nothing more than its OVA released in the West. But then the localization team kept in Marth and Roy, and that's the story of how Fire Emblem escaped this in the West. Some games in the series are still obscure outside Japan, but thankfully those were released on consoles that have long since been discontinued and will likely escape obscurity via a Nintendo Switch port.
* *Donkey Kong*:
	+ The arcade version is this thanks to many arcades closing down. It was later ported to the NES, which was itself ported to Animal Crossing and Nintendo's *Virtual Console* line.
		- This especially affected its sequel *Donkey Kong Jr.*- outside of a re-release of the NES port in the first Animal Crossing, a re-release of the Game & Watch port (itself ported to the Game Boy as part of its Game & Watch Gallery series in the 1990s; see below) as DSiWare, and a re-release of the NES port to Nintendo 3DS Ambassadors (people who paid the launch price for their 3DS) and as part of the *Virtual Console* line, the original arcade game itself hasn't been mentioned by Nintendo since the 1990s.
	+ The Game Boy port (not related to the various Game Boy Advance ports), especially if you're after a physical copy (it was ported to Nintendo's Virtual Console line). It's rare to see a video of it on YouTube, and brand new copies will make you shell out a bunch of cash just to get it. Used copies aren't much better, the cheapest going for a little more than $7 on Amazon as of this writing.
	+ Apparently, not many people know that Cranky Kong was the original Donkey Kong. Same with the Cranky in Tropical Freeze, who apparently is the original DKC's Donkey Kong.
* Speaking of the Game & Watch, the original Game & Watch games are completely obscure. For new Game & Watch fans, your best bet is playing as Mr. Game & Watch in Super Smash Bros. or playing the DSiWare re-releases (not to mention the Virtual Console releases of the Game & Watch Gallery series). Oh, yeah. And they cost money. Ironically, Nintendo still knows about the Game & Watch and even named a WarioWare game after it (albeit replacing "Watch" with "Wario").
* While it's rare to find an obscure Mario game, the PC games definitely count as this.
	+ And its three TV shows as well (though the latter did become a cult hit on YouTube thanks to YouTube Poop). WildBrain Spark eventually ended up uploading official online prints of the series.
	+ The one-two-three punch of Mario games: Super Mario Bros. 2 (Japanese), Doki Doki Panic and Super Mario Bros. 2. The former game initially was this outside Japan due to Nintendo of America deeming the game too hard for America; it was eventually released in North America (remade) on Super Mario All-Stars, and eventually the original version was released in North America via the Wii, 3DS, and Nintendo Switch (but no physical releases). The releases in the US market the game as *The Lost Levels* due to Super Mario Bros. 2 (the game the US got), which was basically the first and only US appearance of characters from Doki Doki Panic, a game otherwise obscure outside Japan, and the first appearance of the enemies within *Doki Doki Panic*. As for Super Mario Bros. 2 US? It was the only one involved in the mess that didn't have that obscurity, as it was re-released multiple times.
* Animal Crossing itself, at least before the first GameCube version came to the West. As of this writing, if you ask a Western gamer how many games are in the franchise, they'll probably say 7 (the GameCube version, Wild World, City Folk, New Leaf, Happy Home Designer, Pocket Camp, and New Horizons). However, the original N64 version (as well as another version released after the GameCube version ported to the West) was never released outside Japan, and thus is only mentioned as part of the franchise's history in the West.
* *Tomodachi Collection* outside Japan, at least at first. This changed with *Tomodachi Life*.
* *Panel de Pon*, especially in its original, unedited form. It's a game about cute fairies (before *Rilu Rilu Fairilu* even existed, mind you), and yet every time Nintendo brought it to America, it was retooled. It was once even retooled into a *Pokémon* game. It took until 2020 for Nintendo to bring the original version over... *unlocalized*.