Wii hits 7 million sales in Japan
by Alexander Sliwinski 
{ Nov 26th 2008 at 10:00AM }
Not that slowing sales mean much when the Wii retail engine is fed by high-octane jet fuel (and sacrificed kittens). Supplies of Wii are still expected to be tight during the holiday season, with GameStop planning to have issues keeping stock for a third Christmas in a row.
_thumbnail.jpg "Lunar: Silver Star Harmony")
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
baby sea tuna @ Nov 26th 2008 10:11AM
Nooo! Won't someone think of the poor kittens?!
Seriously though, wow. Gamecube is probably pretty jealous right about now.
cypher19ign @ Nov 26th 2008 10:19AM
Not really. The sales of two gamecubes duct-taped together will probably end up being the sales of the gamecube twice over.
/did i just blow your mind or WHAT
baby sea tuna @ Nov 26th 2008 10:25AM
It's mathemagical!
Titanium_Orchid @ Nov 26th 2008 4:28PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsBJqFeJstg
N-zero @ Nov 26th 2008 10:19AM
Makes you wonder a little more why third parties won't just give nintendo a chance. Just for one year work on some wii games for the core gamer and see how they do if they don't like the outcome then they could say whatever they want about core games not selling on wii.
Retrodude @ Nov 26th 2008 10:32AM
It would be cool if Capcom would do a Devil May Cry just for Wii, or if Kojima-san would get on the ball and do a MGS for Wii. I don't think there's a snowball's chance in hell they will, but it would be neat if they did.
I think 3rd parties have to take a different approach in the way they develop and even how they market their Wii titles. Someone needs to put out some good wares for this poor system; I've been playing the crap out of my 360 and PS3 while my Wii sits wimpering in the corner (Mario Galaxy was wonderful, however).
straynova @ Nov 26th 2008 10:36AM
Part of it could be that Nintendo seems to be secretive when it comes to sharing info with 3rd parties. Many 3rd party developers found out about Wii Motion Plus during the same press conference that the public watched. If you don't share your toys with 3rd party developers, how can the developers support you?
baby sea tuna @ Nov 26th 2008 10:37AM
Yeah, the problem is, while there are a shitload of 3rd Party Wii titles, there's a dearth of ones that are actually worth buying or playing.
Retrodude @ Nov 26th 2008 10:44AM
It looks like Sega's onto something with MadWorld, and The Conduit looks great as well. The publishers need to promote the hell out of these titles; it's beyond me why many unique games such as these release with little or no fanfare. They need to set aside enough cash to promote these games sufficiently; as the saying goes, you have to spend money to make money.
samfish @ Nov 26th 2008 10:50AM
With Sega, you can at least know that they'll promote the Hell out of their games. It's very rare that they don't run a strong ad campaign, even though it's never a guarantee of success (NiGHTS and Valkyria Chronicles say hi!).
I hope The Conduit and MadWorld sell great, though. Lord knows that High Voltage has worked hard enough on their game and the Platinum/Clover guys deserve a huge hit.
Mr Khan @ Nov 26th 2008 12:36PM
Japanese 3rd parties have been warming around, just not with the core franchises that are also big in the west
e.g, you see Monster Hunter 3 on Wii, but Soul Calibur 4 and Resident Evil 5 on PS360
SEGA, of course, has been providing the best 3rd party support, while you're seeing a lot of interesting stuff come across from Bandai-Namco, and smaller guys like Atlus and Marvelous Interactive
xFenixKnightx @ Nov 26th 2008 10:27AM
Wish they woulda had a black Wii when I got mine :(
Dirty @ Nov 26th 2008 10:46AM
Nothing a little spray paint wont fix.
xFenixKnightx @ Nov 26th 2008 11:32AM
Suuuuuure, I think my wife will be fine with that...
lol
Dirty @ Nov 26th 2008 11:56AM
Your right, white hides dust better anyways.
Lee @ Nov 26th 2008 12:35PM
My PS3 claims otherwise.
Mr Khan @ Nov 26th 2008 12:38PM
I had to disconnect my Wii to move it back home for my brief Thanksgiving repose, and it was mighty dusty
:P
Alien Lord @ Nov 26th 2008 10:36AM
They are just now hitting 7 million in Japan, from the sound of things they should be hitting 21 million in Japan by now.
Haggard @ Nov 26th 2008 11:01AM
Nintendo purposefully limits supply. You think after this long they're physically incapable of producing enough Wiis? (a console which has sold at a profit from day one unlike the other two)
Alien Lord @ Nov 26th 2008 11:18AM
@Haggard from the way Nintendo makes it sound you would think they'd have sold more then 7 million units in Japan alone. Though you are most likely right that Nintendo keeps the supply limited to keep the price up.
Mr Khan @ Nov 26th 2008 12:37PM
21 million in Japan would mean 1 in 6 of the whole population had one
Might be true for the DS, but consoles in general have steadily been falling out of favor in Japan.
BPMOmega [gamertag] @ Nov 26th 2008 2:48PM
@Haggard:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v348/BPMdotEXE/Macros/NTSA.jpg
Do you honestly believe that Nintendo is withholding stock, or are you just being a troll?
Wii has passed both other current-gen consoles in all regions by leaps and bounds. Hell, it's even passing up PS2 where it was in this point of life.
To sell that much, and you still think they're withholding stock?
sam @ Nov 26th 2008 6:20PM
@bpm: lol, very appropriate image.
as for Wii sales, great, now (like everyone else) I just hope there are more good game releases for it next year... I'm still playing mario kart (and tetris online) but another top-quality game or two wouldn't hurt.
It will also be interesting to see if sales begin to drop off; otherwise, next year Wii may overtake PS3/60. Right now PS3/60 still has a larger userbase (although not by much) so it's not surprising developers still prefer to make most games for that platform rather than Wii. There's also demographic issues (Wii presumably has more kids than the other platforms, meaning that 'mature' games may be less attractive). However, the scarcity of quality Wii games does mean that a top quality Wii-exclusive entry in a major franchise (GTA, etc) should sell pretty well - as well as giving somewhat of a chance to newcomers like The Conduit, I hope.
(I don't think anyone should be too unrealistic about sales for that and Mad World, though... even if the games are fantastic, will they outsell e.g. either of the two Resident Evil games? I doubt it, but let's see.)