It wasn’t so long ago that the Nintendo Wii was easily winning the monthly NPD numbers, second occasionally to the DS but still constantly showing Nintendo sales dominance. Recently those sales have slowed, but company president Reggie Fils-Aime still has faith that they’ll see sustained success thanks to late adopters.
“The back half of any system cycle attracts a higher proportion of buyers who are concerned with price, ease of use and group play,” he wrote in a statement to the L.A. Times. “[T]his late-adopter group is the next audience for the Wii.” He also pointed out that even as sales slow, the Wii’s lifetime sales far outpace those of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
Fils-Aime’s words may carry hints of a price drop. The Wii has stood at an MSRP of $199.99 since last year, but pointing out that late-adopters may have been concerned with price could mean that Nintendo is considering a new price drop. This would run counter to comments from CEO Satoru Iwata, who explicitly said the company isn’t considering a drop in the “near future.”
