Super Mario Run won't be able to compete with the likes of Pokemon GO or Candy Crush Saga due to its $9.99 price tag, claims Sensor Tower.

The market intelligence firm studied the mobile marketplace for premium apps and compared them against free apps on the iOS App Store.

It found that 92% of all games launched in Q3 2016 were free-to-play. This has increased steadily since Q1 2012, when the percentage of free games launched was 56%.

However, the actual number of premium games released has remained almost the same. Sensor Tower found that 5,400 premium games were released on average in every quarter between Q1 2012 and Q3 2016.

On the up

Free games, however, have seen a massive increase in release numbers. It has grown from around 4,900 games launched in Q1 2012 to 63,000 in Q3 2016.

Sensor Tower also revealed that just five premium games priced $9.99 or above placed anywhere in the iOS top grossing charts, out of 1,400 games.

That said, the firm was quick to state that "in no way are we suggesting that Super Mario Run doesn’t stand to earn Nintendo significant revenue".

We recently asked our expert Mobile Mavens what they thought of Super Mario Run's pricing, and many were confident the game will do well for Nintendo.

Super Mario Run is expected to launch on iOS on December 15th. Aside from being 'free-to-start' and having a single $9.99 paywall to unlock the entire game, it will feature no IAPs.