Nintendo Reports Big Net Loss; Wii U Wasn't the Savior It Hoped for

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Shoppers walk under the logo of Nintendo and Super Mario characters at an electronics store in Tokyo Wednesday, May 7, 2014. Nintendo Co. sank to a loss for the fiscal year ended March as sales of its Wii U game machine continued to lag, but the Japanese manufacturer of Pokemon and Super Mario games promised Wednesday to return to profit this year.

Image: Shizuo Kambayashi/Associated Press

By Todd Wasserman2014-05-07 13:04:46 UTC

Nintendo reported its third consecutive full-year loss on Wednesday as Wii U holiday sales failed to help the company's bottom line.

The company posted a net loss of 23.2 billion yen ($228 million) for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2014. That comes after a loss of $366 million in fiscal 2012 and $461.2 million in fiscal 2011.

See also: 3 Times Nintendo Brought Itself Back From The Brink

During fiscal 2013, Nintendo sold 6.17 million Wii U units since the device's November 2012 release. In the last year, the company sold approximately 2.8 million units in what the company described as a "challenging sales situation." As The Verge notes, that means Nintendo sold around 310,000 units in the most-recent quarter, a 20% drop versus the period one year ago.

The Wii U, designed to woo core gamers back to the Nintendo platform, vied with Sony's PlayStation 4 and Microsoft's Xbox One releases last fall. PlayStation 4 sales topped 7 million units worldwide so far while, Xbox One sales have eclipsed 5 million.

Nintendo is promising it will be back in the black in fiscal 2014.

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Topics: Business, Nintendo, Wii U