Pachter: Wii U Sells 80k, 'An Unusual Number of Returns'

(Updated: 5:43pm)

NPD has released it's official numbers stating that Wii U sales were up 40% from Jan-Feb, meaning that February sales for the Wii U are officially around 64k. Lower than the 80K number referenced by analysists in this article.

In some pretty terrible news for Nintendo, Cnet is reporting that analyst guru Michael Pachter is estimating just 80K in sales for the Wii U in February, with dismal sales stemming from “a relatively thin release slate and an unusual number of returns”.

Also noted was that the Wii also sold 80K in the same month, exceeding expectations, which makes me wonder if people are just getting the two consoles confused and buying the wrong one. An amusing thought, sure, but I also think that Nintendo should have severed ties to the Wii completely with the new console. Their failure to do this has led to a high level of console confusion between consumers and the industry alike, at least in the opening days of the announcements.

Although that suspected 80k sales number is higher than the 57k sold in January, Nintendo's newest bride is still trailing considerably behind 7 year old hardware. In the same month of February the PS3 is believed to have sold 165,000 and the Xbox had a 26th consecutive month at the top spot with 302,000 in sales according to offical NPD numbers.

Pachter had this to say in full:

The Wii sold nearly double our estimate as the Wii U vastly underperformed our expectations, likely due to a relatively thin release slate and an unusual number of returns. It is difficult to envision a turnaround in Wii U hardware sales without a price cut or until more compelling software becomes available, but we think that weekly sales of 20,000 units is likely. We think that the long-term appeal of the console will be severely limited by the perception that the next consoles from Microsoft and Sony will be much more powerful with greater online integration and multimedia functionality.

Simply put, people don't want the Wii U now, and they're certainly not going to want it when they get a full view of Microsofts/sony's bells and whistles.

The real NPD numbers come out later this week, but Pachter has been pretty close so far. In any case, Nintendo's “Going Sega Moment” watch should probably start around now.