Nintendo lowers full-year sales forecast over sluggish hardware and software sales in overseas market and yen appreciation; company expects to sell 5.5 million Wii U units by April.

Nintendo has lowered its full-year sales forecast for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2013 due to weaker than expected 3DS sales in overseas markets and unfavorable yen appreciation. The Mario maker had previously forecast ¥20 billion ($250.7 million) in profits, but now expects that figure to come in at ¥6 billion ($75.2 million), down a significant 70 percent.

3DS hardware sales jumped by 65 percent and software sales surged 134 percent during Nintendo's six-month period ended September 30, but this was not enough to offset the ongoing appreciation of the Japanese yen, Nintendo said.

According to Nintendo's figures, the company's currency exchange losses totaled ¥23.2 billion ($290 million) during its latest fiscal period.

Total 3DS hardware sales for the period hit 5.06 million units, with New Super Mario Bros. 2, Super Mario 3D Land, and Mario Kart 7 helping push software sales to 19.03 million units.

Pokemon Black and White 2 sales totaled 4.26 million life-to-date, Nintendo said. DS sales fell to 980,000 units during the period, with software sales coming in at 17.3 million units. Nintendo attributed this downturn to "accelerated generational change" to the 3DS.

As for Wii sales, Nintendo has moved over 1 million copies of Mario Party 9, with total hardware and software sales for the six-month period coming in at 1.32 million and 23.74 million units respectively. This performance was due to "few new titles" released during the period.

Regarding the Wii U, Nintendo said it expects to sell 5.5 million consoles and 24 million pieces of software by April 2013.

In all, for the fiscal half-year, Nintendo posted revenue of ¥201 billion ($2.5 billion) down 6.8 percent from the 215.7 billion ($2.7 billion) it took in during this time last year. Losses came in at ¥28 billion ($351 million), compared to losses of ¥70.3 ($881 million) this time last year.

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