Nintendo Announces Profitability As Wii U and Software Sales Beat Expectations

For everyone who agrees that Nintendo had an amazing year last year- shipping great, feature complete, and polished games, in a year where games were either disappointing, or unfinished, or cynical cash grabs, or somehow all three of them- this will be good news. The Japanese gaming giant announced its financial results for the quarter ending December 31, 2014, and there’s mostly good news here- the Wii U performed very well, selling 1.91 million units worldwide, reaching lifetime sales of 9.2 million units. The Wii U has already sold more this financial year than it did for the entirety of the previous one, and Nintendo still has one more quarter to go in which to widen this lead.

3DS sales were a little less impressive, which is understandable when you consider that the handheld is nearing its fifth year on the market, and that Nintendo neglected to introduce the New Nintendo 3DS models worldwide- it sold 4.99 million units worldwide, for lifetime sales of 50.41 million units.

The most impressive showing in all this, however, was the software. The star of the show was the excellent Pokemon OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire, selling a mind boggling 9.35 million units worldwide- remember, the game launched on November 21, so it sold that much in less than a month. It is now the highest and fastest selling game of 2014, as far as reported numbers go.

Elsewhere, Super Smash Bros. put up similarly impressive units- Super Smash Bros. for 3DS sold 6.19 million units, while Super Smash Bros. for Wii U managed 3.39 million units, the latter, again, achieving this target in just one month. Cumulatively, the games have sold 9.58 million units already.

In other news, Mario Kart 8 has now sold 4.77 million units, and continues its over 50% attach ratio for Wii U hardware sales; Amiibos have sold 5.7 million units worldwide, and Nintendo raised the software forecast for Wii U software.

All was not rosy, however- Wii U hardware sales were down year on year for the quarter (though still up overall, as noted before); 3DS has underperformed, and projections for both, its hardware and software, were revised downwards. Nintendo is also expecting to make less money this year than they projected, although they revised them upwards for higher for ordinary income and net income.

You can check out their full financial report here, there’s loads to see. But on the whole, it is good to see Nintendo do well again, after a few difficult years for them- at this point, they have well and truly earned it.