Mario, Zelda Spur Wii Success

Nintendo shares Wii and DS numbers for Europe.

It's no secret that the Nintendo 64 was heavily outperformed by the PlayStation during the 1990s, and the GameCube didn't fare much better when it arrived in the early years of the new millennium. These days, though, it's good to be Nintendo.

The normally secretive company revealed some of its sales figures this week and they sketch a picture of a firm whose only problem is how to keep up with demand for its hardware.

Nintendo said on Thursday that it has sold more than 6 million Wiis since releasing the console in December 2006. This is no doubt in part down to the success of Wii Sports, which is packaged with the console in Europe.

The top-selling game in Europe was Wii Play, a minigame collection that also comes with a second Wii remote. It's not just games targeted at casual players that are doing well, though.

For whatever reason, there's a popular sentiment that the Wii is not as good for long-time gamers as it is for newcomers. The numbers, for Nintendo's own games at least, belie that sentiment.

Both of Nintendo's core franchises have seen success on the Wii. Launch game Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess has sold 1.3 million copies, a number matched by sales of Mario's new 3D platforming game Super Mario Galaxy, released in December. Mario Party 8 has also sold more than a million units.

As successful as the Wii has been, the DS has been an even bigger success for Nintendo.

Lifetime sales of the portable have reached 20 million units now. The top-selling games are proof that Nintendo's outreach program has been a massive success.

Nintendogs has long been popular with non-traditional gamers and Nintendo said that cumulative sales have now reached 8 million units.

Also hitting big numbers is the Brain Training series. The first, Dr Kawashima's Brain Training, has sold 5 million copies and its successor, More Brain Training From Dr Kawashima, has added another 2.8 million units to the tally.

Alex Wollenschlaeger
Editor, Kikizo