Nintendo Announces Wii Information, Worldwide Shipments

Following its overwhelming debut at E3 2006 - and a whole lot of speculations and media buzz, might I add - Nintendo today announced the current fiscal year unit shipment forecast for its new home game system, Wii. Nintendo also confirmed that the price of the Wii system, which incorporates unique freehand control, will not exceed $250 in America, or ¥25,000 in Japan. The company plans to ship 6 million systems to retailers around the world between its launch in the fourth quarter of 2006 and the end of its fiscal year on March 31, 2007. Which still leaves us wondering as to how many units will actually be available the moment Wii launches...

The projections are part of a full-year financial forecast that sees growth of 18 percent in sales globally, based on anticipated continuing strong demand for the Nintendo DS portable game system, as well as a successful launch for Wii.

The company also said it expects to sell 17 million Wii games in the period. Exact launch dates, identification of the launch library of titles and details on the unique Virtual Console aspect of Wii will be announced soon. Until then, you can read more about Wii's recently announced Classic Controller and the WiiConnect24 system here, as well as some juicy bits about the "gamecubed" Wiis used for Nintendo's pre-E3 conference here.

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