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Iwata - 3DS suffers from software variety in NA/EU, slower sales as well
I have just explained that in the Japanese market the Nintendo 3DS platform is already established as the market leader. On the other hand, however, we could not launch hit titles which could lead the markets towards the end of the year abroad and sales are largely behind our target overseas. This is one of the main reasons for our downward revision to our annual shipment target from 17.50 million units to 15.00 million units.
One explanation for not creating enough momentum in the overseas markets is that we have so far been unable to release hit titles other than the three Mario titles. In the domestic market, "Animal Crossing: New Leaf" became the great hit that it did, and software publishers have also enjoyed hit titles, meaning that we have a wide range of software to choose from, but in the overseas markets, Nintendo 3DS has not yet solved its chicken-and-egg problem as a platform. To put it another way, we do not yet have a virtuous cycle where hardware sales and software sales drive one another. Because of this, our lineup lacks diversity, and as a result, Nintendo 3DS does not have as wide and diverse an appeal as Nintendo DS. As a consequence, software sales, which should ideally grow in proportion to hardware sales, did not grow as expected.
In light of this, I think the problem boils down to how we can create in the overseas markets the same trend as in the Japanese market.
This problem did exist with Nintendo DS, which gained momentum in the order of Japan, Europe and the U.S. The U.S. and Europe certainly have much larger populations, so the market potential for us should be larger than the Japanese market. This year we will strive to bring out the market potential that we could not achieve last year.
Link
One explanation for not creating enough momentum in the overseas markets is that we have so far been unable to release hit titles other than the three Mario titles. In the domestic market, "Animal Crossing: New Leaf" became the great hit that it did, and software publishers have also enjoyed hit titles, meaning that we have a wide range of software to choose from, but in the overseas markets, Nintendo 3DS has not yet solved its chicken-and-egg problem as a platform. To put it another way, we do not yet have a virtuous cycle where hardware sales and software sales drive one another. Because of this, our lineup lacks diversity, and as a result, Nintendo 3DS does not have as wide and diverse an appeal as Nintendo DS. As a consequence, software sales, which should ideally grow in proportion to hardware sales, did not grow as expected.
In light of this, I think the problem boils down to how we can create in the overseas markets the same trend as in the Japanese market.
This problem did exist with Nintendo DS, which gained momentum in the order of Japan, Europe and the U.S. The U.S. and Europe certainly have much larger populations, so the market potential for us should be larger than the Japanese market. This year we will strive to bring out the market potential that we could not achieve last year.
Link