A record that Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto recalled Pokémon creator Satoshi Tajiri joking that beating Mario meant selling each customer two copies, one reason Red and Green exist

How it’s built

1. Read from Nintendo’s Japanese-language summary of the question-and-answer session at its results briefing for the half-year to September 2025, published in November 2025.

What we assumed

Nothing. The figure is used as published.

Sanity check

It is a recollection of a joke made decades earlier, told by Miyamoto, not Tajiri. It shows the two-version idea had a sales motive, not how large that motive was.

Where it comes from

The line in the source

「任天堂のマリオを超えようと思ったら1人のお客様にソフトを2本売らないと超えられない」と私に冗談を言った…それが『ポケットモンスター 赤・緑』が生まれた理由の一つでもあります。

In English

Tajiri joked: to beat Mario you must sell 2 copies to each customer; that is one reason Red/Green were born (Miyamoto, Nintendo Q&A)