Update: I’ve been informed by Nintendo of America that this is for amiibo rather than Wii U hardware sales. The source Games Beat/Venture Beat incorrectly reported this.
VentureBeat has confirmed today that the Wii U has now sold over 11 million units worldwide since it launched back in 2012. The news came as part of the NPD figures which cover North America, but clearly the 11 million is worldwide. If you are interested you can check out the top ten best-selling video games during the month of November in the United States, here.
Love the Wii U, but truth be told, 15 Million Worldwide might be it’s limit.
Hard to say, if Zelda U, Pikmin 4, Yooka-Laylee and Retro’s game (Metroid U) only sell 4 million Wii U’s world wide…then I give up on “gamers”.
What Metroid U? There was actually news about Metroid coming for Wii U?? Last time I heard that it was confirmed that it will come to NX instead.
No, there is no Metroid U. Just WiiU owners in denial.
Not denial. Stupidity, same stupidity as accepting that Federation Force shit as a better Metroid game.
Pikmin 4 and Metroid are probably going to be saved for the NX. Pikmin 4 being a potential Launch Title.
Zelda U will be able to sell quite a bit of Wii U’s, but not as much as Mario Kart and Smash Bros did.
Yooka-Laylee looks great, but I feel like only those that own a Wii U, prior to launch, will buy it on Wii U.
Starfox Zero looks like the only other big Nintendo Franchise that can be a System Seller.
Pikmin 4 is reusing assets from Pikmin 3, that would be a Wii U game.
That was never confirmed.
You are correct it is not confirm and is speculation. So i will rephrase it, if Pikmin 4 is reusing assets from Pikmin 3 then it will be a Wii U game. That is how developers are able to make multiple games in a generations.
Although the Wi U has been sold with a profit — allowing the company to make actual money –, Nintendo has lost huge marketshare and mindshare this generation. One doesn’t need to be an expert to get aware that this is going to negatively impact Nintendo’s reputation and lead to decreased sales of its next handheld/home console — at least in the short run.
A revamp through a rebranding move is urgent and needed. I hope the upcoming platforms rescue the old Nintendo vibe, although I’m a bit skeptical about it.
” A revamp through a rebranding move is urgent and needed. I hope the upcoming platforms rescue the old Nintendo vibe, although I’m a bit skeptical about it. ”
Well Kimishima-san did say that they are moving away from the Wii and Wii U brands and the fact they have finally decided to put out a unified account system are steps in the right direction. It isn’t something that’s gonna happen overnight but I’m confident that Nintendo will get with the times and get their act together and if the rumors are true, the NX is shaping up be that platform that could be help them do just that
Fingers crossed. I really want Nintendo to be truly back to business.
Me too, because without their innovation, we would only get prettier versions of whats already been done…
I don’t believe any of that even if it happens. I’m sure they’ll drop the ball again.
But you have to look at the fact Nintendo has been around 126 years, and went 30 years in a row of pure profit before these past 3-4 years. So in reality anyone who does their research knows Nintendo will bounce back into the spot light sooner or later, Nintendo hasn’t died off in 126 years, they wont go anywhere now. Even if they continue fucking themselves and fans over for another 50 years they will still be around lol.
Yeah, they literally have the Scrooge McDuck money bin at the bank. But they really need to worry about their current management.
so, new theme?
this one is TOO flashy
We were running Twenty Fifteen theme before this is the Twenty Sixteen one :)
Lol you must be getting pretty tired of all the complaints by now.
by flashy i mean the color(white)
I dont tolerate brightness that much, that’s the reason
Picked mine up yesterday, can’t wait to open it up and tame that beast!
I don’t know if this counts for a celebration, or a wake up call…
I’d say… The second option.
IDK, they mentioned this very same year that they finally reached the 10 Million mark and in just a few months they got another million, I think they’re finally starting to pick up (better later than never).
In fact, Wii U numbers have been getting better YOY. But they are still below expectations, and the big picture of this generation is not going to shape up well for Nintendo, home console wise. I believe they will try to strike back with their next platforms, but it will take a time to convince consumers that the lack of support faced by the WiI U is not going to happen again.
I salute Nintendo for selling 11 million Wii Us but had they marketed and advertised the Wii U better and maybe have Super Mario Maker as their flagship launch title and limit the game droughts a little better, the Wii U would probably be at 2o million units sold by now. Hopefully Nintendo will learn from this generation and get 3rd parties onboard and make vast improvements with the NX
In order to have thirdies on the boat Nintendo has to moneyhat. I personally don’t agree with this model, but this is the industry’s current, standard model, and it seems Nintendo does not appreciate that practice. So… We have yet to figure out how things will be for Nintendo once the NX — or whatever — is out.
Yep. Nintendo’s days of trying to sell hardware without software are finished. They need to realize this, or things will only get darker.
Smart choice.
It changes nothing, Wii U has been selling slowly and consistantly, so obviously eventually it would reach 11 million. It will still grow slowly a bit more with each game.
Wii U is averaging 3.67 million Wii U a year. It is up from the average of 3.54 it was doing last year.
Now let’s see if the NX can sell even more.
NX is starting off with a disadvantage, it’s only advantage we can say so far is not having the word “Wii” associated with it lol. But the NX handheld will do fine. NX Home Console will be a repeat of Wii U.
Man I didnt know you had a time machine to see how well the NX will sell! Can I borrow it? Stop stating facts about a system you literally no next to nothing about. Hell you dong even know the name! Who are you Michael Pachter ?
*stating your opinion as fact
*don’t
Still remember when they said the first year would sell 12 million.
How embarrassing.
If they advertised properly and EA didn’t stab them in the back causing the other 3rd party guys to leave then it would have lol.
Nintendo stabbed themselves in the back. If not for EA and Ubisoft, the wiiu would have been buried the first year.
11 millions darn the wii u is gone , i mostly use my wii u to browse the internet and watch videos and movies.
That is wonderful that you use it for that. I use mine to play video games but what you mentioned above. People use their consoles for different reasons. Great diversity.
Lol.
My Wii U has been the BEST console to have at college so far.
No joke, everyone plays Smash Bros on it every night and we play til’ 4 or 5 in the morning. It’s fantastic. I have never seen so many people in one place playing video games. Literally my whole hall plays the game. Even people who don’t frequent video games want to jump in for a round or two.
It is such a respected tradition here on my hall that I don’t even take my Wii U back to my room anymore. It is just left out there in the community lounge for anyone to use if they have steam to blow off.
Smash Bros is literally a culture here.
It’s beautiful.
And the fights we get into are intense. I’m surprised we haven’t been written up his semester for all the screaming and death threats lolol!
Yep, like all NES consoles, a great local machine.
If only we were all still in collage. *sigh*
XD Profit or not, this is fucking pathetic. I was hoping for at least 12-13 million. It seems my expectations for Nintendo are still too high this generation. Nintendo & the Wii U are doing great this gen? Hah! Clearly some of you, like smashbroslink, aren’t looking at the bigger, long term picture when you spout the little “but they are making a profit” damage control excuse for the Wii U being a massive fucking failure! *sigh* I just want Nintendo to do better but apparently some of these so called fans are happy with Nintendo’s mediocrity. Despite my complaints, I am happy Nintendo is doing as well as they are doing. BUT I also notice the bad & I won’t let the little good distract me from the massive bad going on. And that is… The Wii U. Is. Sinking! What exactly has Nintendo done to fix this? It might as well be nothing because what they are doing just isn’t working.
If a product makes a profit in the end, even if it’s $1, that’s not a failure. It’s pathetic sure. But it isn’t technically a failure. You guys love to really push the hate speech cause you can’t have your hourly orgasm without letting out some random bitter hatred for Nintendo for some reason.
You absolute cretin. Clearly you don’t run a business
lol You clearly don’t run a multi-million dollar business. Otherwise, you’d realize just how stupid that sounds. With one little buck, you have enough to buy a bag of chips if you can scrounge up a few pennies to cover the taxes. That won’t pay any of your employees nor will it fund future projects. That’s not success & is an outright failure. Go tell that to a businessman & see how fast they laugh right in your face.
You truly are a damage controlling moron. lol $1 = good profit? You need one hell of a crash course in business.
I don’t care about how many consoles sold or how much the money a company make if I am not employed by that company. What I do care about is the games I play or played on the products I purchased. If Wii U had of sold 100 million, I would feel no different about the console and a game like splatoon may not have happened.
Yeah. I couldnt care less about how it’s selling, it’s still my favorite system this gen. The only reason I do care about that is because I like the system, and I want others to feel the joy I feel when I play it. But if they get that same joy from the PS4 or Xbox one, good on them. I’m not gonna hate on them just because they don’t enjoy the same things I do.
Well i care! Because if Nintendo crashes and burns, I lose a lot of great IP’s! D;
IPs get lost all the time. When you been gaming since, Atari, Colecovision, and Intellivision days then you realize to play whats available and I don’t own the IPs so I have no control what happens to them.
They do, but I don’t remember losing any IP’s from the Ancient days.
Colecovision, Atari, Commador64, the ONLY game/ IP that hasn’t been properly remade is one called 7 Cities of Gold, and I won’t bother going it that but Nintendo has a few unique IP’s that they do really damn well that I’d be sad to lose.
Well you better damn well care if you like the products & hope to continue using them years from now. You can’t be a consumer of their products if they got no money to even make said products.
For one, Nintendo is in no way close to not having money. People talk so much about how bad Wii U is doing but forget that Nintendo has an handheld that have sold plenty. I buy products that are available. If a product is no longer available then it is not in my mind to buy.
^ The Zen is strong with this one.
I really shouldn’t care as much as I do either, it’s really not that important in the grand scheme of things.
We all have done that. Cared too much about something in the grand scheme does not matter. I have just learned to not over think about something I have no control over. It is not healthy for me and do not benefit me at all.
Listen. You can stop the charade. We all know what you’re up to. So just quit you green bastard. If we wanted to hear your bullshit, we’d go back and watch the VHS tapes. Seriously, just stop.
If we all wanted to become Jedi, we’d fly to your ass-in-the-middle-of-no-where.
Give it a break Yoda. We know this is you. :]
I am just being honest. I don’t know how to be any other way. I wasn’t using a Star Wars reference. I was using my life’s reference.
Replying to Jaded dry bones. Yea I care enough about them staying in business. What I meant was I don’t get caught up in sales data and bandwagon over to whoevers selling the best. I want Nintendo to do well because I want their games and I want more people to enjoy their games like I do, not because I care about them Winning a race or something. That’s what I meant.
Yep, I figured. I follow ya!
Congratulations Nintendo. While it may never reach GameCube selling status, it’s still a fun system and really that’s what gaming is about to me.
🐙
WiiU is doing fine 11 million the xbox1 is only at around 13/14 million so wiiu could easy catch xbox1 with pokken,zelda,pikimin4,starfox,and a few more big hitters…..
And winner for the most optimistic pillock goes to you sir. Well done. You won
The Xbox One is actually in the 15 – 18 million range and counting, and that’s with coming out a full year later. The respective gap will continue to widen, even with the Xbox One being a non-factor in Japan.
And they’re still keeping it quiet. Meaning they know it’s a flop to 360.
No, it’s obviously not a flop, but they’re keeping it quiet because they’re trailing the PS4 by quite a bit. No reason to trumpet second place.
People here need to learn what a “flop” is. They think that just because something sells less than its predecessor, it’s a flop. Sales are not always going to climb each gen people. It’s a flop if it doesn’t sell anymore and no one buy it before a good profit is made.
Right. If they were trailing to PS4, you think they would’ve gotten the balls to announce the actual sales numbers by now would they?
to be hnest I was expected 25M Wii U in 5 years to be the minimum, below that the wii U is a failure. In 2 years Nintendo need to sell 14 M units (good luck with that). 11 Milions after 3 years is not a good news and quiet worrying. At this stage they should be around 15-20M marks and I don’t think whatever systems going to come out in 2017 going to sell well. My reason is Nintendo does not seems to have learn from the wii U failure.
I remember Iwata-san stating they learnt from the troublesome 3DS launch, did you see any sign of it??? NO at all, in fact the opposite I will say.
The issue I forsee with the NX already from what I can gather, is the device seems to be so different from console as we know it that people will be left confuse and will result in a failure. Additionally nintendo will focus on the portable aspect of the NX or the way to control the NX.
What frustrate me the most with the Wii U is that console has way much more potential untapped. If I do a patcher thing, I would estimated Nintendo exploited 40% of this console’s potential.
Good thinking. With the Wii U, Nintendo tried to give third parties a chance to succeed. Launch lineup was good if a person was a Nintendo only gamer meaning they didn’t buy batman, assassin’s creed, mass effect on other consoles. The system came with sports games. It came with a couple nintendo games. It had a must game and a fighting game. It just didn’t take off as they or anyone that expected it to sell. It also didn’t help they didn’t forsee the issues with developing for HD. Sometimes, you can’t see that happen until you start going through it.
Nintendo shoulda thought ahead Nd not have launched a console before they knew how to develope software for it. Nintendo is no Jedi, Yoda. Don’t even try to say they are.
How can think of the problems without working with the software? You cannot see issues with driving unless you drive a car. I get it. Your thing is to be jaded. Be upset. Be angry with Nintendo. I don’t disagree with how you feel about them. Jedi thing is no making sense. If that what you want to call me then that is fine.
Careful. Expecting & wanting Nintendo to do better with the Wii U and access it’s full potential will be considered hate speech. Instead, be happy & praise Nintendo for being so successful at selling 11 million units in 3 years since they made a tiny little profit. Yay! Millions of dollars spent on a product & you only made a few thousands of dollars! SUCCESS!!! *rolls eyes* Nintendo & some of their fans apparently don’t think with logic. When you make a product for 20 million bucks, if you make back only 50% of the production costs, you’re product has effectively failed because you only made enough money off of it to pay your employees & pay for the production costs. As for money to fund future & bigger projects? Hah! Enjoy making mobile games for the next 5-10 years to get back the money you lost, and then some, for the massive failure that forced you into mobile gaming in the first place. The problem is so many are so quick to jump to the “But Nintendo has billions in the bank! The Wii U is a success because of the back up money Nintendo has!” Yeah. That’s well & good but some of the money they put back in the bank is not just for a rainy day but some of has to be put up for retirement funds for when one of their employees one day retires from the business. You can’t just dip all willy nilly into those reserves of money. Not to mention they need to put some back in case of a disaster like say one of their buildings gets destroyed by a very bad storm. Etc, etc…
Valid points. Nintendo makes money from the 3DS. They don’t rely on one product but many products. That is what businesses do. Some things work and some things don’t work. Wii U didn’t work like they wanted it to and maybe 3DS didn’t even but a Wii and DS was going to be tough to do again back to back.
*cough* Ass kisser!
*points at the *rolls eyes* part* That first part of my paragraph was sarcasm, bub, which the rolls eyes part should have clarified. It’s okay. I won’t hold your mistake against you.
Oh. That was a misunderstanding. XP
We have those between us on a rare occasion, anyway, so you’re fine.
Eh. I’m not surprised Amibos sold this well.
On the other hand, I am a bit surprised NoA contacted you personally to correct this article. Nice job on becoming a pretty high-profile news outlet on their radar.
Seriously, this site is bigger than you think.
It’s Microtransactions. Of course that scam is gonna sell well to a lot of idiots.
You really know nothing, huh? “Microtransactions.” Wow.~
Can you actually play with them in games? No. They’re just there to unlock tiny BS contents $13 per pop and collect dust. Smash Bros. doesn’t even count because the default AI even at level 9 fights and reacts just the same way so Amiibo for that is muted.
” AI even at level 9 fights and reacts just the same way so Amiibo for that is muted.”
And all your credibility just flew out the window….wait….you didn’t have any. Never mind.~
Also, it’s funny how you say you can’t play with them in games, and then discredit the game that does let you play with them. Also, Mario Party 10 let you.
Finally, paying 13 bucks for a figure to own is not a microtransaction. Get informed.~
Wait… This article mistook the amiibo sales for Wii U sales? *facepalm* Talk about a massive failure, guys. But look, though! NoA did something SMART for a change! lol *sighs with relief, though* So there is still a chance the Wii U at least hit 13-15 million consoles sold worldwide… 13 being my realistic expectations & 15 being my Nintendo hopeful expectations.
The best estimate for Wii U is still around 11 million at this point, which is probably why there was the confusion with the Amiibo number.
No! I must keep to the Nintendo fanboy mentality that they will hit the 15m mark this year & then sell another 15 million in 2016! Nintendo will save the Wii U because the NX won’t come out til late 2017, early 2018! You’re just being a Nintendo hater! /s
*sigh* I’m scared that will be the case. 11 million consoles sold in 3 years worldwide… Ugh..! I can’t believe some people will actually call that a success all because of the phrase “We’re making a profit!”
If a company sold 100 million consoles and lost 1 dollar on each one, is it a sucess or failure?
You’re referring to Wii or PS3? lol
not referring to any console just speaking in general.
If they are losing a dollar on each one, I’d imagine they aren’t even making a profit at all & are simply getting the money they already spent back. So I’d classify that as a failure.
It’s OK to lose money on each console if you make it up in other areas, like the percentage of software sales, online service fees, etc. That’s one thing post-Crash console business models got right.
I know but it doesn’t change the fact your other product failed even if the other product made enough money to make sure the failure didn’t adversely effect your business.
It’s all the same product. You can’t separate one from the other.
11 million in 3 years. Still sad.
I have more fun gaming a few decent mobile games than this shit. In fact, even the original GameBoy has more fun games than Wii U. Even if Vita only has PS3 ports, it’s still a better library. That’s how fucking a pathetic Wii U really is.
Why are you back? More specifically, why are you on an article about the Wii U, when it has already been established that you dispise the Wii U?
He has nothing better to do in his life.
-5/10
You try too hard.