Nintendo’s 3DS has now reached 61 million units sold worldwide, while the Wii U has sold 13 million, according to the company’s recently released Q2 2016 financial reports.
The company saw the 3DS perform particularly strongly outside of Japan in the quarter, shipping nearly 970,000 units in North America – an increase from 750,000 in the previous period last year. Overall, 2.7 million 3DS’s were sold in the quarter, up from 2.28 million in Q2 2015.
The company largely attributed the 3DS’s continued strong sales performance to the popularity of mobile phenomenon Pokémon Go, released in July:
“Pokémon GO led to increased sales of software in the Pokémon series released in the past and drove the Nintendo 3DS family hardware sales growth, particularly outside of Japan. The sales volume for hardware this period was 2.71 million units (19 percent increase on a year-on-year basis), while software held steady with the previous year at 19.23 million units sold.”
As expected, Wii U sales struggled with the recent announcement of the Switch being anticipated for some time, with 560,000 units shifting worldwide compared to 1.19 million in Q2 2015.
Software-wise, the 3DS saw a little over 19 million units sold, almost identical to the same period last year, while the Wii U saw 8.3 million units sold, down from 12.4 million in Q2 2015.
Overall, the company reported an ordinary loss of 30.8 billion yen (approx. $294 million USD) for the quarter despite recording 12.0 billion yen in shares of the profits of The Pokémon Company, of which it holds a 32 percent stake, which it attributed mainly to foreign exchange rate losses.
However, due to the sale of part of their ownership in the company that manages the Seattle Mariners Major League Baseball team, Nintendo recorded gain on sales of investment securities totalling 62.7 billion yen as extraordinary income, meaning that profit attributable to owners of parent was 38.2 billion yen.