Worldwide, Nintendo can seem to do no wrong. Profits are soaring. Their share price is hitting record highs. Nintendo is on fire.
But here in New Zealand things are different — Nintendo seems to be floundering in New Zealand. Big time.
GPstore has always been a strong supporter of Nintendo products. Nintendo has, over the years, been the confined to the hard-core gaming niche which has suited us well. We’ve always punched above our weight for Nintendo and we probably sell more Nintendo than many of the mass merchants.
But, our sales from the last quarter show the Nintendo Wii has hit a wall. The Wi’s share of GPstore’s game sales for the quarter ended March were down 41% over the previous quarter. The Wii came in at sixth place — behind Sony’s PSP and even its own Nintendo DS. Given we’re probably preforming well above the general market… this is a real concern.
The Nintendo Wii, with its revolutionary game controller, lends itself brilliantly, to appeal to the mass market… to even reach people that PlayStation and Xbox can’t. People who aren’t even gamers.
But with Nintendo’s own premium releases now missing their street dates, the future is starting to look questionable. Mario Kart was due April 24th, but it’s gone AWOL. The local Nintendo distributors can’t provide a release date, yet the game was released in Australia two weeks ago.
Retailers and gamers must be wondering… what the heck is going on? I wish I knew.
Nintendo’s revolutionary Wii Fit is due May 8th, but I’d be surprised if it makes that date. So far there’s little hype, no press coverage and muted demand for this revolutionary “game”. There’s no doubt it is a very very cool product… but its already going to under-perform.
So, even though its not officially duck season until tomorrow, the question has to be asked… is Nintendo a dead duck in New Zealand? Is there room for only two console platforms in the NZ market?
We’re big Nintendo fans and we really do want to see it to do well here, so we certainly hope not. But the clock is ticking. What are your thoughts?
A quick update to this item… both games are now due 29th May. No reasons have been given to the delays.