These worries come after Nintendo reduced its forecast for profit. KBC Financial Products analyst Hiroshi Kamide fears that Nintendo's Wii may be running out of steam.
Kamide thinks that this forecast reduction "suggests that the roaring pace of Wii growth that we’ve seen until now may be over"
"The numbers also imply that we are going to see a sudden collapse in the fourth quarter from record margins to some of the thinnest margins Nintendo has experienced for three years."
Gamasutra says that our boy, Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter, feels that the Wii will remain "solid" this year, but even he points out that software sales are up only 3 percent.
Kamide is down in the mouth about the software too, but feels the situation is much worse. He feels that Nintendo knows that "something big has gone wrong, and that people are not buying the machines."
Again, I'm not an analyst, but I'm not so worried about Nintendo. And I also think they have a few things up their sleeves this year. See? I can make sh*t up too!
Dale North is Destructoid's Editor-In-Chief, a founding editor, and specialist in Japanese gaming. An accomplished musician, Dale was reporting from Japan during the earthquakes of 2011. Luckily, he got the fuck out alive and is home in America now with his wife and beloved corgi, Einstein. Dale is also a co-founder of Destructoid's sister anime site
Japanator. Likes Corgis, Sega Saturn, PSP, iPhone, Photographic tools.
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Contest:
9:40 AM on 01.30.2009
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I don't doubt that the hardware is reaching a saturation point soon, but it's hard to expect a rise in software sales when the only games that even look interesting are very infrequent and are 3rd party titles!
Nintendo's major fault is that they realized early on that the Wii was in high demand, but refused (and still refuse!) to compliment it properly with thing like appropriate DLC and an external hard drive to compensate for that.
Yeah, yeah, the PS3/360 fanboys always bitch about the graphics. Whatever. I didn't buy the Wii for graphical prowess. But I don't see Nintendo trying to do anything to extend the Wii to something at least resembling the other two consoles. With the expected price drop of the PS3 this year, Nintendo had better start to make some moves on improving the Wii itself to this analyst's forecast will probably come true.
Counter intuitive or because of, Japan is also getting more games on their release list than NA or EU.
As much as I'd love to call this a "Wii told you so" regarding being less than tenacious with exciting releases, I don't know that this is exactly that . . . yet.
Kart?
. . .some would say City Folk. Not me though . . .
I'd go with Brawl, as it's actauly a game and not a pissaround pretending to be a game.
I would have to say Wario land shake it was a good first party game too. short but good.
Guess what? *Only* 3% gain in the midst of massive layoffs and people losing their homes is probably a good thing. If Meryll Lynch and CitiGroup had *only* 3% gains last year we wouldn't be in this mess.
Come now, you sound as if people actually play other games than Halo 3 and MGS4 on their own systems. =P
It might be just me, but it seems like first-party support isn't really around so much this generation for any of the consoles.
Increasingly difficult year-over-year comparisons
Global recession, with rising unemployment and reduced consumer spending
nintendo is making so much profit atm that they can easly push the next system out if people dont buy wii's anymore and people will fall for it again.
Not.
nintendo is making so much profit atm that they can easly push the next system out if people dont buy wii's anymore and people will fall for it again.
and people complainin that there are no games on the wii.
yes i agree there arent many top tier titels but get some friends and play some brawl this game doesnt get old.
it's about time it collapsed. What, Animal Crossing is nintendo's hardcore answer? lol.
what a joke.
I love my wii, don't get me wrong. but it's been out for years now, and is aging horribly. HORRIBLY.
You can't blame Nintendo for the hardcore's woes--they released their heavy-hitters early on, and even then, look at how the hardcore "treated" them in the GameCube years. I'm getting tired of hearing the same flawed argument for three years straight, that being "Nintendo's done nothing for us!" when they've done FAR more than what third parties have done.
"but even he points out that software sales are up only 3 percent."
OMFG, end of the world.
Nintendo also lost a lot of share value because it might profit less. Go figure. I am at a loss with the current financial system.
I think the Wii will be fine in Japan.
2008 was a comparitively weak year for decent software, but 2009 should make up for that thanks to the industry catching up with the success of the Wii and releasing decent third party games.
Sony are the ones that need to worry a shedload more than Nintendo, the PS3 is unfortunately failing miserably and may well end up being the 'Gamecube' of the current-gen consoles. It's around 10 times cheaper to develop, test and publish PS3 games compared to Wii games and due to the PS3's poor marketshare companies are going to find it difficult to justify the expense of producing games for the system...there won't be that many games being released for the PS3 in 3 or 4 years time unfortunately unless Sony see sense and reduce the price of the PS3. :o(
Software sales for:
Americas were up 94.5% (90.29M up from 46.41M)
Others were up 129.4% (62.46M up from 27.23M)
The lack of growth in Japan is an issue, but the Wii is doing great in the rest of the world. Any belief in a 'sudden collapse' is just silly when Nintendo hasn't done any price drops, or introduced colour revisions.
All the shit-ware on the wii is just as much nintendo's fault as is it yours for letting them get away with it. Big hitters early on? What are you talking about? so their games lineup includes just the good games at launch and that's it? It's been two years now, and we get a Brawl (that I still play every day) that's dumb'd down and incredibly slow. We get a mario part @ 4:3 that's HORRIBLE and SHITTY and pails in comparison to the other previously released mario party on the cube.
we get a zelda game MADE for the gamecube. We haven't even gotten one for the wii yet! Just another port!
What else.. Oh, we get mario galaxy i *loved*, but why'd they give you the last more fun item? For what? You can only use the ability to fly in the main map for a short amount of time.
which you don't need cus you can easily access the map by jumping.
sorry, nintendo's gonne to shovelware. They're merely a toy now. Sure, may sell like hot cakes, but just so you know, Britney Spears current album hit number 1 as well. And Mariah Carey has sold more album than Elvis. So sure, popularity = awesome! or popularity = britney spears.
The Wii isn't in the same league as The XBOX and PS3 anymore. It's an awesome selling toy. No more, no less.