Nintendo announces record fiscal year

Nintendo has just announced a record fiscal year through to March 2009, but has indicated a slowing of profit in the current financial year.

Sales were up to ¥1,838,622 million (£12.2 billion), nine per cent up on the previous year, with an operating profit of ¥555,263 million (£3.7 billion), 14 per cent better up on 2008.

A cool 26 million Wiis and 31 million DS units were sold between 1 April 2007 through to 31 March 2008, a total of over 50 million Wiis and 100 million DS units to date worldwide.

However, Nintendo also reported a 42 per cent fall in its last quarterly operating profit due to the yen's strength outweighing healthy game sales - though, despite the yen's recent appreciation, is still not in the red, unlike competitor Sony.

Top-selling games

The Mario and Zelda factory also sold a whopping 197 million games for the DS, and over 204 million games for the Wii in the same year.

The year's top sellers were as follows:

DS

• Brain Age Series - 31.1 million
• Pokemon Platinum - 3.8 million
• Kirby Super Star Ultra - 2.4 million

Wii

• Wii Fit - 18.2 million
• Mario Kart Wii - 15.4 million
• Animal Crossing: City Folk - 3.4 million
• Wii Music - 2.7 million

However, the credit crunch is beginning to bite and Nintendo expects a profit drop of 11.8 per cent in the current fiscal year, which means that profit for April 2009 – March 2010 is estimated to fall to ¥490 billion (£3.27 billion).

Still, not an amount to be sniffed at!

Sales slowdown

Nintendo predicts that it will sell 26 million Wiis and 30 million DS units from April 2009 through to March 2010.

Most excitingly, for the gamers and the fanboys amongst you, Nintendo said that the next Zelda game will broaden the franchise's reach.

"The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks… will appeal to a wider age group of people, and will launch in the later half of the year," said the firm in the financial report.

You can check the full report right here.

Via VG247