Yesterday, leading Japanese financial journal Nikkei reported that Nintendo is planning to end production of its Wii U console before the end of this year, but the company has since refuted that claim.
A Nintendo spokesperson told Japan's ITMedia that the Nikkei report "isn't an announcement from our company", and insisted that it will "continue production beyond the next fiscal year". Nintendo's new fiscal year begins on April 1, 2016.
However, it's worth noting - as Business Insider points out - that not only does Nikkei have a very good track record when it comes to reporting on gaming industry news, but Nintendo has been known to refute reports such as this one, only to end up later proving those reports correct.
And as we pointed out in our own report yesterday, the Wii U has been a sales disaster for Nintendo, with only a tiny fraction of the sales amassed by its PlayStation and Xbox rivals, and even of its own Wii predecessor. Indeed, even after its launch, interest in the Wii U was so low that the company was forced to slash its first-year sales forecast by more than two-thirds. By the end of 2015, Nintendo had sold 12.6 million units since the Wii U's launch in November 2012; despite launching a full year later, over 30 million PlayStation 4s have been sold so far.
Meanwhile, Nintendo announced a year ago that it is working on its next-generation console, currently known as 'Project NX', which it says is "something that is based on an entirely new idea".
Source: ITMedia (translated) via Kotaku
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