Hasta La Gadget!

To no one’s real surprise, Nintendo has confirmed that they won’t be holding a press conference during E3 2013 coming up in June, and they won’t be announcing any new hardware. Instead, the company plans to “announce and have people experience” their software, which could at least mean we’ll see more Wii U features make their debut at the annual gaming expo.

The company addressed the news in its latest quarterly earnings briefing today, and while they don’t plan to release any new hardware, they did mention that they’ll be announcing new Wii U games, although they weren’t clear if that would be at E3 or just in the general future. Nonetheless, we can expect some new titles from the company very soon.

Furthermore, Nintendo is at least planning to host a few smaller private events during E3, one of which will be for American distributors and another will be a private hands-on event for media. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata isn’t planning on speaking at these events, which isn’t too surprising, as he didn’t present at E3 last year either.

It’s particularly sad that one of the big three gaming console makers won’t be appearing in a big way during the year’s largest gaming expo, but it’s really no surprise, since many companies are beginning to drop out of conventions in favor of their own events to announce new products. Microsoft backed out of CES a couple years ago, with Chinese consumer electronics maker Hisense taking their place.

Nintendo skipping E3 2013 press conference is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

We think it’s safe to say considering how Nintendo’s Wii U has been performing lately, the world will be tuning into their E3 press conference this year in anticipation to hear what exactly they have planned to turn things around for the company. That was probably the plan for many gamers around the world, but it looks like they’ll have to look for their Nintendo information elsewhere as the company has announced they won’t be holding a press conference at this year’s E3.

The news came directly from Nintendo president Satoru Iwata during a financial results briefing earlier today, where he says instead of holding a presentation targeted at an international audience, the company plans to hold smaller events specifically directed to different regions. At this year’s E3, Nintendo will focus specifically on its software lineup for the U.S market as they attempt to introduce a new presentation style for this year’s show. (more…)

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: PC, PS3 To Get Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2 Uprising This May 16th, PlayStation 4 DualShock 4 Controller Gets Highlighted In New Video,

Nintendo may have announced its launch lineup of the Wii U’s Virtual Console, (http://www.ubergizmo.com/2013/04/wii-u-virtual-console-launch-lineup-revealed/) but on the other side of the spectrum, they also announced how their console has been selling, and as you could expect, it isn’t good news.

Nintendo announced its quarterly sales for the Wii U reached only 390,000 units since December, well after its holiday boost. In total, the Wii U has sold a total of 3.45 million units. As a result, Nintendo’s profits during the last fiscal year was half of what the company had expected. During the same time frame, the Wii was able to achieve 4 million units sold, although at the same time, the Wii was discounted, which probably made it a better choice for budget-minded gamers. (more…)

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Xbox 720 Will Be Revealed On May 21st, Xbox 360 Gets The CW App With Full Episodes Available Shortly After They Air,

So the Nintendo Wii U has not been doing too hot in terms of sales figures, which could perhaps be attributed to birth pains, but that has not stopped Nintendo from announcing a new spring update recently with additional improvements thrown into the mix. We do know that Nintendo owes the Wii U community their Virtual Console, and here we are with news that the official download of fan-favorite SNES RPG Earthbound will be made available later this year, in addition to a list of the other Virtual Console launch titles for the Wii U.

Among the coterie of titles that used to be hugely popular on NES and SNES platforms include F-Zero, Super Mario World, Balloon Fight, Donkey Kong Jr., Excitebike, Ice Climber, Kirby’s Adventure, and Punch-Out II. These SNES Virtual Console titles will be priced no more than $8, while NES VC games are slightly cheaper at $6, tops. Nintendo’s pretty good at finding new ways for you to buy the same stuff over and over again, no?

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Batman: Arkham Origins To Include Multiplayer Mode [Rumor], Nintendo Sells 390,000 Wii Us In Q1 2013; Promises Release Of Key Nintendo Titles In Q2,

The NPD group has just released a list of the top ten best-selling games in March. The sales of the games were monitored from March 3rd to April 6th. BioShock Infinite topped the list, followed by Tomb Raider, Gears of War: Judgment, God of War: Ascension, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon, MLB 13: The Show, NBA 2K13, The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, and Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3.

The NPD group didn’t release specific sales data, however according to GameSpot, the number 1 game, BioShock Infinite, sold 878,000 copies in March. Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon, which came in 6th place, sold 415,000 copies according to Nintendo. The sales figures for all of the games on the list include the standard edition of the games, collector’s edition, game of the year editions, and bundles, however, games that were purchased in hardware bundles (like the Nintendo 3DS/Luigi Mansion bundles) were not counted.

Total industry sales for March reached $992.5 million. While the sales figure is impressive, it is still a 10% decline year-over-year from March 2012. A majority of the sales were generated by the video games themselves, totaling $602.4 million. However, NPD Group analyst Liam Callahan says that the $992.5 million the game industry made only accounts for about half of what the market really spent in March. He says,

“When you consider our preliminary estimate for other physical format sales in March such as used and rentals at $190 million, and our estimate for digital format sales including full game and add-on content downloads including microtransactions, subscriptions, mobile apps, and the consumer spend on social network games at $670 million, we would estimate the total consumer spend in March to be just under $1.9 billion.”

The month of March turned out to be extremely beneficial to game publisher Take-Two Interactive, who published both BioShock Infinite as well as NBA 2K13. The sales it achieved with both games were the highest sales for any individual company monitored by the NPD Group since it began tracking sales in 1995. Also while sales in the game industry declined 10%, new game launches for last March were still 40% higher than March 2012. Hopefully we see the momentum of March continue on throughout April in the NPD Group’s next report.

[via IGN]

NPD lists the top ten best-selling games in March is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.