Nintendo Switch sales surpass Game Boy and PS4

The Nintendo Switch is now the third best-selling console of all time, surpassing both the Sony PlayStation 4 and the Nintendo Game Boy in total lifetime units sold. Nintendo’s third-quarter earnings report shows that the Switch, Switch OLED and Switch Lite combined sold 8.2 million units between October 1 and December 31, 2022, bringing the console’s total sales to 122.55 million since its launch Release increased in 2017.

Nintendo will increase wages for Japanese employees by 10 percent despite a drop in quarterly earnings

In response to these declines, Nintendo lowered its year-end forecasts for both hardware and software sales, but also announced plans to increase salaries by 10 percent for current and future employees in Japan. Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa said rising wages will help bolster the company’s hiring power after other major Japanese companies took similar steps amid an increasingly tight job market.

Last August, Nintendo reported that production for the Switch console was being impacted by global chip shortages, leading to a drop in shipments and overall sales. Production levels have apparently recovered since then, and Nintendo recently predicted that sales will increase over the course of 2023 due to the increased supply. However, it now appears that a general drop in demand for the Switch could also have contributed to the disappointing sales figures. “The result was weak and that’s a surprise. The holiday season towards the end of the year indicated that hardware sales were not as strong despite increased supply, which also weighed on software sales,” said Hideki Yasuda, an analyst at Toyo Securities Bloomberg. “It is now clear that the momentum of the Switch is pointing downwards.”

The Switch is now third in global sales behind the Nintendo DS and PlayStation 2

Given its waning popularity, the Switch still has a long way to go to become the best-selling console of all time. The Nintendo DS is a close second with 154 million units sold – a number that doesn’t include the 75.9 million units reported for the Nintendo 3DS – while the Sony Playstation 2 comes in second with over 155 million units sold reported ranked first.

Nintendo could further increase demand for the Switch by releasing special models of the console, such as the Nintendo Switch, alongside the big upcoming releases The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. As Yasuda predicts, “If Nintendo prepares at least two special editions, it can still sell more than 20 million units in the next fiscal year.” Unit counts for the OLED, Lite and original Switch models could be included – giving the console a better chance of dethroning the PS2.

Interestingly, one of the few areas where Nintendo saw significant growth was in its gaming cards division, which grew between the 1 same period last year. That’s a meager profit compared to the total 1,295 billion yen (about $9.8 billion) made from video game sales (including hardware, games and software), but this 88 percent increase suggests it That the explosive popularity of Pokémon cards over the past year hasn’t been overhyped.

Source: www.theverge.com