If I had a nickel for every time Nintendo posted huge sales, I'd be almost as rich as they are.
NINTENDO RECORDS BEST HOLIDAY SELLING SEASON IN U.S. VIDEO GAME HISTORY
Virtually Every New Wii and Nintendo DS System Sold Out Across America
REDMOND, Wash., Jan. 11, 2007 – There has never been anything like it.
Independent U.S. sales figures released by the NPD Group today confirmed
a red-hot launch for the new Wii™ system by Nintendo, and the crowning
of the portable Nintendo DS™ as the best-selling video game device of
any type for both the holidays and all of 2006.
Along with stunning success for The Legend of Zelda®: Twilight Princess
and historic sales of accessories, including more than 1.5 million extra
controllers for Wii alone, Nintendo recorded the most successful
across-the-board holiday performance in U.S. video game history.
Among key results:
* Consumers purchased every Wii console available at retail—more
than a million in just the 44 days between U.S. launch and year end.
* With sales of another 1.6 million systems in December alone,
Nintendo DS achieved full year sell-through of 5.3 million.
* The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess was purchased by an
extraordinary 86 percent of Wii buyers, or more than 900,000 games for
that system alone. Coupled with the companion version released in
December for Nintendo GameCube™, the two versions of the newest Zelda
title totaled approximately 1.5 million unit sales in less than seven
weeks, which would represent one of the five best-selling games for the
entire year.
* Wii owners also purchased an average of three additional games
from a wide library of choices, in addition to the Wii Sports title
packed in with every hardware system.
* Two Nintendo DS titles, New Super Mario Bros.® and Brain Age™:
Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day, also were top-10 sellers for the year.
* Throughout the November/December holiday shopping period,
Nintendo accounted for more than half of all video game hardware systems
sold in America.
Earlier this week, Nintendo increased its projected worldwide financial
performance for the year ending on March 31 to be the best in company
history.
“Millions of players, both hard-core and brand-new, are already enjoying
the unique entertainment provided by Wii, but demand for the system
remains incredibly high," says Nintendo of America President Reggie
Fils-Aime. “So our work is just beginning. We're dedicating ourselves to
maximizing both manufacturing and distribution full bore throughout
2007, to make sure everyone who wants to experience the future of video
gaming can do so just as soon as possible."
The momentum behind Wii will continue unabated through the early weeks
of 2007, with retail debuts of WarioWare™: Smooth Moves, Wii Play™ and
Mario Party® 8 from Nintendo; a host of third-party releases; and a
steady stream of classic games made available via download with the Wii
Shop Channel.
