Nintendo missed its sales target for the Wii U, by over 1.5 million consoles, leading everyone to believe that it would be unlikely to turn a profit for the past financial year – except that’s just what it’s done and it’s not too shabby either.
While it actually sold less games and hardware than it did last year, when the company had its first loss in many years, it managed to look a little more effective this year thanks to the strong Yen, which helped Nintendo profit by around seven billion yen (£46 million).
Eurogamer reports however, that if Nintendo doesn’t want to make a catastrophic loss in 2013, it will need to do something about Wii U sales. As it stands, less than 400,000 have been sold since Christmas, making it one of the worst selling consoles of the past decade.
The 3DS is at least selling well, with over 30 million units shifted so far and it’s become the dominant console in Japan, where handhelds are a much more focal point for gamers. However, this doesn’t mean it’s doing as well as was initially hoped, with Nintendo lamenting the lack of momentum the console has built in European and North American markets.
Nintendo does have a lot of money in the bank however, so it can weather storms like this. It just needs to get some good games out on the Wii U or it’ll have units as far as they eye can see that just don’t go anywhere.