Nintendo's Japan branch lets loose a little tidbit: on August 1st, the publisher will release a black Wii system. Along with the black Wii console comes a black Wii Remote, as well as a black Nunchuk and black Classic Controller Pro shipping at the same time. The company also revealed a red Nintendo DSi handheld shipping on July 11th.
Edge has some comments about MotionPlus from Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter and Jesse Divnich of EEDAR. Pachter expects 20% of Wii owners will have purchased one of the MotionPlus game bundles by the end of the year. Divnich expects "over 11 million units by the end of Nintendo's next fiscal year in March 2011, a 15 percent penetration". Both also comment on Ubisoft's decision to make RS2 MotionPlus-only.
TOKYO/OSAKA (Reuters) -
Nintendo Co Ltd reported a 42 percent fall in quarterly operating profit as the yen's strength outweighed robust game sales, and the Japanese video game maker forecast a bigger-than-expected 12 percent profit decline this year, pressuring its shares.
It looks like Capcom's recently down-counted brawler Marvel vs. Capcom 2 isn't coming to your beloved download platform. Responding to a forum post inquiring as to why the fighter was deftly dodging the Wii, Capcom corporate head Christian Svensson said, "This is a downloadable play, not a retail play. We don't actually have any retail rights on this project. And there's no way to get anywhere near the WiiWare file size limit here."
Game hardware sales may be slowing down in Japan, with the Wii slowing down more, but Nintendo can still find milestones to celebrate. According to Enterbrain, the Wii has sold 8 million units in Japan as of April 19. Worldwide, the total number of consoles (shipped) passed 50 million last month. Compared to that, 8 million may not sound huge, but it's about 5 million units more than the PlayStation 3 sold as of last month.
Wii sales have been the lowest they've ever been in Japan. Is the Japanese public losing interest? Screen Digest analyst Ed Barton told GameBizBlog that the Wii sales downturn is mostly due to the lack of staying power exhibited by Animal Crossing: City Folk and Wii Music.
Nintendo Co Ltd said sales of its Wii game console have lost some steam in Japan, but it aims to boost demand again by launching a new version of its blockbuster "Wii Sports" software in June.
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