Nintendo Admits 3DS Sales in the West Are “Currently Weak”

Nintendo’s president Satoru Iwata has admitted that Western sales of the 3DS handheld console aren’t reaching the height the company had hoped.

While it’s true that 3DS sales had performed well during the holiday season they’ve since slumped into something a little less satisfying for Nintendo.

“Considering that the US and European markets are larger than the Japanese market in terms of the size of the population, sales in the US and Europe are supposed to be larger.”

Over in Japan, the 3DS has been selling well, with games for the console often topping the charts. Sales for the 3DS were at an average of 83,000 a week at the start of the year and haven’t significantly dropped since.

“Sales of the Nintendo 3DS are constant in Japan and in fact we could say the sales volume is exceeding our forecast at the start of this fiscal year.”

Europe and North America sadly haven’t seen such a fantastic performance.

“The sales proportion of the Nintendo 3DS is now about 20 per cent of the total video game sales in those markets. Thus, solid sales momentum has not been created.”

“For those investors who understand this situation, they might think that our earnings situation will not turn around in the way we have mentioned, or they might think it will take a much longer time than we expect to revitalise the profit situation.”