Gyaa haa haa! Pokémon beat Sims! Now I'm happy. Thanks for saving the day, mr_pikachu.
Mario deserves his place in my opinion. But Pokémon has had so many helpers with all that, I mean a popular anime, trading card game, and so on. So it's not a wonder those games have sold so well, too. I am not talking about hidden advertisement, but for example I would never have bought the games if the anime wasn't there.