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Nintendo Businesses Portables (Games)

10 Million Nintendo DS Units Sold Since Launch 406

Posted by Zonk from the that's-sold-not-shipped dept.
DS Gamer writes "Nintendo has announced that worldwide sales of their twin-screen handheld console the Nintendo DS have reached the 10 million mark since its launch in the United States during late November 2004. The vast majority of sales have been in the United States (4 million) and Japan (5 million) where the DS became the fastest selling games machine of all time. From the Reuters article: 'It is on the upswing of its life cycle," Perrin Kaplan, Nintendo of America's vice president of marketing, told Reuters in a telephone interview. She declined to give a sales forecast but said the Japan-based company would provide additional information during its upcoming quarterly financial report. Kaplan added that Nintendo's seven-week-old Wi-Fi Connection wireless gaming service has had more than 550,000 unique visitors globally.'" Commentary is available on Forbes and Gamespot.
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10 Million Nintendo DS Units Sold Since Launch More

10 Million Nintendo DS Units Sold Since Launch

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  • As opposed to shipped (Score:3, Insightful)

    by HarvardFrankenstein ( 635329 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:37PM (#14392758) Homepage
    It's good to see them stating sales rather than shipments, unlike Sony, which likes to brag about how many units have been shipped out of their factories but not about how many have actually left the store. That said, I'm a big Nintendo fan, and even I feel inclined to take these numbers as being slightly exagerated, if only by rounding up. Still, this is very, very nice to hear. Perhaps there is room in this industry for innovation after all.

  • Doing the math (Score:5, Funny)

    by ewg ( 158266 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:37PM (#14392760)
    That's 20 million screens!

    And I'll bet 30 million lost styl-i by now...
    • I've had mine for more than a year now, still with the original stylus, though I am thinking of using one of the 4 new ones I have, just so I don't scratch the touchscreen.

    • You'd probably win that bet. Santa brought 2 new DSs to our house Christmas day, which means 4 new styluses. By the end of Christmas day we were down to 3. Fortunately we're still holding at 3...

  • Mario Kart DS (Score:2, Interesting)

    by flynt ( 248848 )
    The online Mario Kart DS mode is incredibly fun and addictive. That in my mind is reason enough to own a DS.

    • Re:Mario Kart DS (Score:5, Informative)

      by geminidomino ( 614729 ) * on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:12PM (#14393048) Journal
      I almost picked it up until I heard that you could only race, no battle mode over WiFi.

      That was definitely a "WTF were they thinking?" moment.
      • Battle mode?!

        You heathen. :)

        • Hey man, I spent the better part of highschool holed up in my room with my two best friends and my brother, beating the shit out of each other with turtle shells and banana peels. ;)

          I want to share this bonding ritual with strangers all over the world (and pwn them!)

      • Battle-mode = lag-sensitive (Score:5, Insightful)

        by MS-06FZ ( 832329 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @02:08PM (#14393595) Homepage Journal
        Most likely they didn't want to do battle mode over IP because it'd be a lot more sensitive to lag issues than race mode.

        Consider: there's not -too- much in race mode that matters, apart from whether your opponent is in front of you, or behind. If you see lag in race mode, most likely it'll mean your opponent's position jumps around (or even that they fall off the track, and mysteriously reappear on it without losing time) - but at a very basic level, the needs of the race are met, in that the relationship between how long it's taking you to get around the track, and how long it's taking them to get around the track is maintained. Every time you get a sync packet from an opponent everything's right with the world again. As for powerups, usually in race mode if you're in a position where you can effectively use a powerup, it won't be too sensitive to lag unless the two players are really right on top of each other. (Drafting doesn't work too well in a laggy game, of course, and in that situation it's tough to say whether a banana peel or other weapon dropped behind the lead player will hit the trailing player...) I guess you could say that while powerups still work in a laggy game, the "combat" aspects of the race mode are those which suffer the most from the lag.

        Battle-mode is, of course, completely combat-oriented. The game isn't oriented around a circuit in which there is an "ahead" and "behind", rather everyone's free to race around and try to fire weapons at each other. It could still work but given that the relationship between players' positions is much less consistent than in a race, and since the entire battle game revolves around powerups and direct kart-to-kart interactions, it would be harder to give a good battle game experience than it is to give a good race experience.

        I love the online race mode, too - it's sort of frustrating sometimes that you can't communicate with your opponents over the link, but other times it's not. It keeps people focused on the game itself rather than all the bickering that often goes with other online games in between rounds. I'm glad they allow the custom emblems, though - it gives people who want to be a jackass an opportunity to do so, but also allows personalization. Really, though, given the potential for abuse I'm surprised they did it at all.

  • Signal/Noise (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Eohl ( 40739 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:39PM (#14392778)
    For my money, the Nintendo DS has had the best signal to noise ratio, with regards to the quality of the games, of any system in its first year since the Dreamcast. Probably even better. I've been absolutely astonished at how often I keep coming back to this little guy, especially considering how dismal it was at launch. The games are really coming at a good pace now...it is hard for a guy with a WoW addiction to keep up.
  • Unfortunately, the Gamecube hasn't been selling very well lately [com.com], so hopefully this makes up for that. I have a soft spot in my heart for Nintendo, who somehow seems less evil than Sony and Microsoft.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:Hopefully this makes up for the Gamecube sales (Score:4, Insightful)

      by dividedsky319 ( 907852 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:46PM (#14392841)
      There's a reason the Gamecube hasn't been selling well... no good new games for it!

      I enjoy my Gamecube more than my PS2 and Xbox, but even I'll admit that the support for the GC has been dwindling... really the only game on the horizon that looks promising is Zelda.

      And, the Revolution will be coming out hopefully within a few months of Zelda for the GC... the GC is near the end of its life, there's a reason why sales are starting to slow.
      • Yep. Honestly, GC has had a poor lineup of new games lately. Yeah, Mario Strikers is supposed to be good. And i think there was another Mario Party in there somewhere. But really, the GC has had little worth buying come out since Resident Evil 4 (which was a LONG time ago now). It doesn't even get many ports anymore.

        It isn't odd for a platform to slow down at the end of its lifespan (although perhaps this is a bit extreme), and I'm sure things will be different when Revolution comes. I can't wait to get one
    • I'm an idiot. The article I linked in the above post was way too old.

      Try this article [palgn.com.au], which makes it look more promising.

  • And with good reason (Score:4, Informative)

    by dividedsky319 ( 907852 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:42PM (#14392805)
    I got a DS for Christmas, and I've been very very happy with it.

    When it first came out, I wasn't really interested in it... the dual screens seemed like they were pointless, and I didn't think a touch screen would work well in games.

    Well, after playing Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow for a few weeks, as well as Mario Kart, Animal Crossing and Nintendogs, I'm sold... Nintendo knew what they were doing. The game developers are really taking advantage of what Nintendo offered them. I never thought having two screens would be so convenient.

    And the future looks bright for the DS in the area of upcoming games...

    In addition, the number of amazing games for the DS gives me great hope for the Revolution. Nintendo is doing something different again, and the fact that so many developers (not just Nintendo) have embraced the hardware of the DS leads me to believe they'll do the same for the Revolution and its controller.
    • I couldn't agree more. A buddy of mine got a DS about 6 months ago and at the time I mocked him for it. Especially when he expressed interest in Nintendogs. Fast forward to December 25th. I open a gift from my wife, and it's a DS, only now I'm thrilled, because I got her one for Christmas too (although neither asked the other for one). Two days later I bought Nintendogs out of jealousy from watching her play the copy I bought her.

      That, coupled with the amazingly fun and convenient wireless play on Mari

  • Nintendo Wi-Fi (Score:4, Informative)

    by TheSpoom ( 715771 ) * <{ten.00mrebu} {ta} {todhsals}> on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:43PM (#14392811) Homepage Journal
    I got a DS for Christmas, and while the system is great (I've been playing Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time [nintendods.com], good game, at least as good as the last Mario and Luigi), I was disappointed that there was no wi-fi connectivity outside of games. I mean, if the games connect to my wireless router and hotspots anyway, how hard would it have been to include a wireless browser in the interface outside of games?

    I've heard about people trying to reverse engineer the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection so that this is possible, but I really think they should have included this in the first place. It would have had so many uses.

    • Re:Nintendo Wi-Fi (Score:3, Insightful)

      by TheSpoom ( 715771 ) *
      It should be noted that I exclude Pictochat in this, because that's very limited. I can't, for example, check my messages [iknow.ca] with it.
    • Nintendo's mantra in terms of online connectivity right now is "simplicity". You turn the game on, hit a few buttons, and you're set. More functionality doesn't necessarily equate to more complexity, but more often than not, it does. I think that might be their reasoning behind leaving out the browser.

      Still, they're bound to revamp the DS at some point or another. Who knows? Might get your browser after all.

    • Re:Nintendo Wi-Fi (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      It could simply be that the Wifi wasn't ready by the time the system launched and so they went with what they could do, Pictochat. That would be understandable. I do agree though that a built-in browser would be awesome. The touch screen could be used for the keyboard as well as clicking on links and such. Perhaps the top screen could show a zoomed-out view of the entire page while the bottom screen showed a 100% size view of a certain portion of it, with the ability to drag that portion with the touchs

    • Purpose, Control, Etc. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by PhYrE2k2 ( 806396 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:40PM (#14393334)
      The first thing I thought of when you said that was the headline: Outraged parents demand parental controls. Think about this for a second? You are taking a gaming machine that you can trust your kids to drive around and jump on evil snails to kill them and opening up the potential for anything- porn, news, viruses, scripting, java, etc. Why would you do that as Nintendo? It's a parental control nightmare and a security nightmare.

      The second argument is why would you go outside its intended purpose? It's a gaming handheld machine with a few buttons and a touch-screen. You'd have be bring in typing (keyboard) for URLs, viewing of various image formats, scripting, and other joyous necessities (ever tried turning off javascript and surfing... you won't get far). If someone wants the web, they have a cell phone and a computer.

      If I recall correctly, isn't chat built in though?

      -M

    • Re:Nintendo Wi-Fi (Score:3, Informative)

      by Guppy06 ( 410832 )
      If you want a handheld multimedia web browser, go get a handheld multimedia web browser. Nintendo make game consoles.

      "how hard would it have been to include a wireless browser in the interface outside of games?"

      An IP stack does not a web browser make. They'd have to pay a licensing fee for the browser, which would likely cost about as much as a game. If it was built-in to the unit, that'd increase the price of the unit. And even then there's going to be issues with website compatability (as there was wi
    • I mean, if the games connect to my wireless router and hotspots anyway, how hard would it have been to include a wireless browser in the interface outside of games?
       
      The answer to that is "four megabytes of ram".

  • And people are already counting them out... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by DwarfGoanna ( 447841 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:45PM (#14392831)
    I really think this is a harbinger of how the Revolution is going to do in the next gen console "war". How many people screamed gimmick and added up specs and features when it came to the DS vs PSP? Is it the same people doing it now for the consoles? I'm glad Nintendo is doing interesting stuff, and its nice to see the market reward them for it. I fully expect the Rev to whip up on the competition by selling fun in a neat little box, while the gamerz fanboys drool over blood spatters that are 13% more realistic and crow about shit that I couldn't care less about unless it adds up to that nebulous quality, fun.


    You know, kinda like what happened with these handhelds. =)

    • Nintendo, to me, has always focused more on fun, entertaining games for the entire family; mo other system has these fun games such as Mario Kart and Animal Crossing. Sony and Microsoft focus on the realistic and violence aspects moreso, leading to a system for more mature audiences. The thing is, Nintendo gets most of these games too. So, in the long run, any Nintendo system seems like a sure-bet for a better system. I'd take Mario Kart any day over Project Gotham Racing. Why? Because to me, its a whole lo

  • Is that so. (Score:4, Funny)

    by millennial ( 830897 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:49PM (#14392862) Journal
    And yet I can't find a single person over the age of 18 that has one. Other than... me...
    • I'm 21 (22 in two weeks) and I have one.
    • I'm 24, and i'm planning to buy one as soon as I can spare the cash.

      Maybe you just don't happen to have friends interested in it, or maybe they bought into the whole "OMG Nintendo is teh kiddie!!!1" stereotype. Not that anecdotal evidence like this means much, though.

    • Re:Is that so. (Score:4, Informative)

      by GweeDo ( 127172 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:08PM (#14393022) Homepage
      At WiTendoFi.com [witendofi.com] we have a growing user base that is a real mix of ages. I run the site and am 24 years old. We have plent of 20+ users there (and 20- of course).
    • I'm 32 and I have friends in their thirties that own DS's. One even purchased a Gamecube for GC animal crossing after playing the DS one.
    • I passed 18 some years ago, and I have one. ;) You're not alone!
    • I'm 29, just bought one for an early birthday present (couldn't wait two months). This is the most fantastic little game machine I've played in a long time! Granted, "long time" means "Atari Lynx." The PSP, as nice as it is, just doesn't work for me. As weird as using the touch screen to control a character is, that slide-knob on the PSP is even more alien.

      My only gripes are that there isn't a way to adjust the brightness and the top and bottom screens are too far apart.

      PS: Playing Mario Kart through th

    • I have the solution for your case. In your moment of maximum desperation at your loneliness, just shout "OUENDAAAAAAAN"

      (kudos to anyone who gets it. Game of the year AFAIC).

  • Journalism (Score:5, Funny)

    by mypalmike ( 454265 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @12:55PM (#14392912) Homepage
    Forbes:
    "With more than five million units sold in Japan since its December 2004 regional launch, the DS has become the fastest-selling gaming machine in the country's history. Japanese gamers have also bought more than a million copies of four different titles within one year of the system's launch: Nintendogs--a game where users play with, train, pet, and wash a virtual dog, Animal Crossing, Wild World, Brain Age, and Brain Flex."
    - Chris Noon

    Gamespot:
    "With more than 5 million units sold in Japan since its December 2004 regional launch, the DS has become the fastest-selling gaming machine in Japan's history. In another first, Japanese gamers have scooped up more than a million copies of four different titles within one year of a system's launch: Nintendogs, Animal Crossing: Wild World, Brain Age, and Brain Flex."
    - Tim Surette

    • Re:Journalism (Score:4, Insightful)

      by NilObject ( 522433 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @02:02PM (#14393538)
      This is much more common than what you might think. 90% of news articles these days are actually just recycled press releases. Companies, organizations, nutbags, and other misfits push out a press release to thousands of "news organizations," who then recycle much of the release verbatim, and then release it as "news".

      The downside is that 90% of news is of low quality with no investigation or questioning ever occuring during the writing of the article.

      The updside is that, if you know how to work the system, you can get massive coverage for your comany/organization/sex toy shop.
  • Final Fantasy 4 on the DS is great. Being able to play GBA games on a lighted screen without the buttons being scrunched is always a Good Thing (tm).

    Of course, FF4 GBA has tons of bugs. Berserk is buggy, slowing down your character to the point of uselessness. The airship flying is choppy (which is dumb because the GBA has better mode 7 than the SNES did). The "darkness" debuff does nothing. Worst of all, do things in the wrong order on the menu screen and your saves will be erased [square-enix.co.jp]. (Yes that bug is i
  • The DS is simply a great gaming system. It doesn't try and be everything to everyone. It just does its job wonderfully. If you are looking to find people to play on the WiFi games be sure to try out WiTenDoFi.com [witendofi.com]. It is a really great way to quickly find people to play and more.

  • DS simply has better games than the competition (Score:5, Interesting)

    by leather_helmet ( 887398 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:03PM (#14392981)
    ...And better developer support

    I have developed games for the GBA, DS & have access to a PSP dev kit for which we have not developed a game yet

    From the development point of view, NOA is a lot easier to deal with throughout the whole process (concept submission, feedback, testing & final approval) - Sony on the other hand almost makes the developer feel like they are doing them a favor by letting them develop for the PSP - the whole process is overly convoluted and a major pain in the ass...
    • Erm. Huh?
      You have developed for NDS and GBA but not PSP, and are saying the PSP development cycle is difficult. what the?
      Having developed on both, and knowing many coders who have developed on both, the general consensus is that Nintendos support is horrendous. Their devkits - erm.. half assed at best (did you even have a GBA Nintendo devkit? - they are slower to use than the USB Carts!!!). And the NDS systems are really no better. Then if you want to talk about features the DS and GBA are sorely missing ma
    • Yet another way Nintendo is like Apple.

  • Good Thing (Score:3, Insightful)

    by symbolic ( 11752 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:07PM (#14393013)
    Everyone seemed to have been predicting the demise of Nintendo, or at least becoming relegated to the status of a second-rate gaming hardware company. With two giants in close proximity (Sony and Microsoft), it's good to see that at least some semblance of balance will continue for a while longer.

  • 4 million in US, 5 million in Japan, 0 in Greece (Score:4, Funny)

    by Ucklak ( 755284 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:09PM (#14393026)
    I think Game Boys are illegal in Greece
    http://news.com.com/2100-1040-956357.html [com.com]
  • Back in November, the Inquirer [theinquirer.net] et al. ran a story that hinted at an upcoming hardware revamp for the DS. I've been putting off getting the system since. (Osborn syndrome) Anyone heard anything since?
  • The article (for those who read it) said:

    The company's Game Boy Advance SP, the newest version of Nintendo's popular hand-held system, sold 4.6 million units in North America in 2005, compared with 7.6 million in 2004.

    The GBA Micro is newer than the GBA SP.

    Both are darn cool as well.

    Also, chalk another > 20 year old DS owner here... Not a kiddy system IMO...

  • No WPA Support Yet (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Milican ( 58140 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:28PM (#14393206) Journal
    "WEP Key is a security setting for your router. WEP is the only security that is compatible with the Nintendo DS Wi-Fi Connection. You will need to set your router for WEP security -- or remove security on your router -- to use the Nintendo DS at this access point." Nintendo [nintendowifi.com]

    I wish they supported WPA. WEP sucks and no security is not a good option for home use.

    JOhn

  • Europe? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BenjyD ( 316700 ) on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:29PM (#14393216)
    4 million in Japan and 5 million in the US leaves just 1 million sales in the rest of the world, presumably mostly in Europe. In terms of market size, Europe is pretty big, I wonder why the DS sales are so much lower?
    • Perhaps partly becuase North America and Japan got it in late 2004. Nintendo showed how much they love Europe by delaying it to March, so less time to get sales (we got the PSP in September...). Plus Europe has never been as much of a Nintendo loving area.

  • Price point (Score:5, Insightful)

    by NoNeeeed ( 157503 ) <slash&paulleader,co,uk> on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @01:48PM (#14393405)
    Something that a lot of people missed when the DS and PSP were introduced, was the price point.

    Taking a look at Argos (major UK retailer, the kind of place many people buy these things from)...

    * PSP : 180GBP
    * Nintendo DS : 90GBP

    PSP games start at 30GBP and go up to 35. DS games start at 15 and go up to 30.

    The DS is not selling to the kind of people who will put down 200quid for a graphics card just to play the latest blood-fest, it sells to the huge number of casual gamers who want something fun. For the price of a PSP you can buy a DS and three games.

    The DS also sells to parents buying presents and I imagine it did a hell of a lot better over christmas than the PSP.

    This is exactly what happened with the original gameboy. When I was a kid I, and most of my friends had gameboys. They may not have been colour like the Sega Gamegear or Atari Lynx, but our parents could afford them, the batteries lasted an age, and the games were fantastic. Colour would have been great, but it wasn't worth the money (and the power drain)

    Sheer brute force power is not everything when it comes to these sorts of machines. Nintendo understands this. The handheld market is not just a portable version of the mainstream. It is a whole other beast.

  • I just got back from a winter vacation with 3 female non-gamers and I can tell you the Train your brain game [ign.com] was a huge hit among us. I was wondering how my sister, mom and girlfriend who never before would have given any game a second look were so addicted to this game - I honestly didn't get any time in on Advance Wars DS because my DS was constantly being used by one of them at all times.

    My opinion is the stylus. I think - just like the Nintendo Revolution is aimed at non-gamers by giving them a more

  • And it ain't stopping... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by RyoShin ( 610051 ) <tukaro.gmail@com> on Wednesday January 04, 2006 @02:08PM (#14393590) Homepage Journal
    The DS's numbers are impressive, but we aren't anywhere close to the peak of the system.

    Great games like Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, and Nintendogs, and some interesting titles like Pheonix Wright: Ace Attorney and XX-XY, have shown consumers that the touch screen is not a gimmick. If I recall correctly, NiFi already has half a million users, and that's after a month of NiFi. By comparison, doesn't XBox Live have a little over a million after at least a year?

    There are still hot games coming to the DS to spur sales, too. The Pokemon series has consecutively been a hot seller, oftening bumping hardware unit sales with its release. Pokemon Diamond and Pearl, the first regular RPG entries to the series on the DS, is due out sometime this year. It has been confirmed that these games will use NiFi to trade Pokemon, chat, and, most importantly, battle. The trade-and-battle theme of Pokemon has screamed for MMO features, and the DS is the first machine equipped and ready to take the charge. (This will be the game that gets me to buy a DS.)

    If Pokemon is not your thing, you're not out of luck. Metroid Prime: Hunters, the much delayed multiplayer FPS, might be right up your alley. The Metroid Prime series has had strong sales, and when this game finally releases, it's going to boost sales (sorry for the pun) once again. (I'm uncertain, but I believe part of the delay was to add NiFi to MP:H).

    And remember, we're still waiting for a Zelda game. While one has been confirmed in process, no details have been released. Did someone say Twilight Princess followup?

    It's successes like this that allow Nintendo to go to the edge with new ideas like the Revolution.

    Disclaimer: Yes, I am a fanboy, and my rantings may be taken as such.

  • Nintendo's success. (Score:2, Informative)

    by MaWeiTao ( 908546 )
    Not to take anything from this, but I can't help but think that a significant part of Nintendo's success with the DS is due to the fact that the PSP turned out to be an utter failure. The expectations were a lot higher for the PSP and Sony failed to deliver. The DS struggled initially, there's wasn't much compelling for the DS at the start and I think people were still hoping for something good on the PSP. There's nothing but crap on that system while the DS has Nintendo's expertise in gaming supporting it.
  • It's good to still see Nintendo doing well after chasing the audience of gamers they want instead of the broadest market possible, perhaps this will point to a more fun generation of games from them focusing on the user experience rather than trying to keep up with Sony and MS

  • Price-wise (Score:2, Interesting)

    by lattyware ( 934246 )
    Alot of people ague to me that 'Yes, the DS may have good games, but the PSP can play DVDs!' which annoys me as, if you buy a DS you can afford to buy a small travel DVD player with built in screen, that will play DVDs, unlike the PSP, which only plays UMDs. People don't seem to realise that the PSP is a little small to fit a DVD in. I even have GBAMP, 2 x 512 compact flash cards and FlashMe and am using moonshell to watch video and listen to music on my DS. And with Advance Wars and Mario Kart. It's a muc

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