The Wii U’s sales have been horrifically low over the course of its entire life – over three years since its launch, and it still has not managed to hit even 13 million units sold worldwide – but the forecast for Wii U sales over the coming financial year really takes the cake. Nintendo isn’t even expecting to sell a million units over an entire year- just 800,000 Wii Us sold by March 2017.
An investor decided to ask Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima about this extremely low forecast for Wii U sales-and Mr. Kimishima answered that he does believe that NX sales will cover for the paltry forecast for the Wii U, when it launches next March.
“We are predicting about 800,000 Wii U hardware sales in the fiscal year ending March 2017, which is a decrease of about 2.4 million units compared to the previous year,” he said. “NX and smart device business will be essential to cover this gap, but we also expect download content business to play a role. However, we are planning with the expectation that NX sales will compensate for much of the impact on sales from reduced Wii U hardware sales.”
So apparently, Nintendo is planning for the NX to sell enough in a month – March 2017 – that it will cover for the terrible performance of the Wii U, and, to a lesser extent, the 3DS. That means they are probably looking for the NX to have a strong launch- which, considering that they delayed its release into March just so it would have enough compelling titles right away, I can see happening.