Nintendo Profits Nosedive After 6 Years of Gains

From PC World: You can't really blame Nintendo for losing a little steam of late. After all, the company's cruised along in bulletproof plated consumer-appeal for half a decade, with Microsoft and Sony playing catch-up in their wake.

So when Businessweek writes that Nintendo's profits are set to fall for the first time in six years, bear in mind we're still talking about a company that sold 700,000 Nintendo DS's, 558,000 Wiis, and held four of the top 10 software sales slots in March's retail numbers. March 2010 Wii sales nearly equaled Microsoft and Sony's combined console numbers, and that's pitting older Wii games like Wii Fit Plus and New Super Mario Bros against March debuts like God of War III, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, and Final Fantasy III.

And after 2009, well, we're talking about a year that'll be tough to replicate whatever the "big three" do. Everyone that looked good then looks mediocre now, which is why Sony's PS3 come off gleaming in recent year-over-year figures--they were selling poorly against Microsoft and Nintendo's gains still a year ago. Without the $100 price drop last August, they'd be dead last, as in "dead not lasting," instead of their current position, "last and holding."

At least one analyst thinks Nintendo's undershooting, stating they expect "the results to be better than the company forecasts for the Wii."

We'll see when Nintendo drops its fiscal numbers (and Activision releases theirs, including Modern Warfare 2 sales) on Thursday.

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