In a bevy of announcements today, Nintendo let word ring forth across the land that their upcoming Wii console will sell for no more than $250 USD in America, and no more than 25,000 Yen in Japan. This news comes as many in the game industry speculated that the console would be priced at a competitive $299 USD in North America.
Since E3, momentum has largely been Nintendo’s to manipulate, and this price announcement may only further speculation that the Wii will reverse the large market share losses Nintendo encountered with the current generation GameCube console. With a price likely between $199 USD and $249 USD, Wii will be, by far, the cheapest of the next-gen consoles on the market this holiday season.
Nintendo also announced that they plan to ship 6 million Wii units worldwide between the console’s November launch date and the end of March 2007. In the same period, Nintendo also predicts sales of 17 million units of software, working out mathematically to almost 3 games per console sold.
The announcements were made as projections from a full-year financial forecast. The forecast also predicted a jump of 18% in sales for Nintendo.
