(Tokyo) Japanese video game pioneer Nintendo on Friday maintained its modest annual forecast, in the face of a sharp slowdown in sales of its Switch console while its successor is not expected for several months.
The group, which saw its net profit fall by 55.3% between April and June, still expects an annual net profit of 300 billion yen (2.8 billion Canadian dollars) for the 2024/25 financial year, which will end at the end of March, which would be a decline of 39% over one year.
Nintendo, traditionally jealous of its secrets, surprised by confirming on X last May the existence of the console that will succeed the Switch, promising an announcement on this subject by next March at the latest.
Until then, players and investors are reduced to speculation on the release date and specifications of the one that will inevitably be compared to its big sister released in 2017, and which has since sold more than 143 million copies, according to the latest figures from Nintendo.
The Switch is the third best-selling console in video game history behind Sony’s PlayStation 2 and the Nintendo DS.
The group maintained its target of selling an additional 13.5 million Switches during the financial year.
“I would say Nintendo is in a bit of a delicate situation right now. It’s a transition year for them, with no major game releases planned,” said analyst Serkan Toto of Kantan Games in Tokyo, interviewed by AFP ahead of the results.
In the first quarter, Nintendo saw its turnover fall by 46.5% year-on-year, with console sales down 46.3% and games down 41.3%. However, the figures suffer from the comparison with the previous year, which was marked by very good sales of the game “Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.”
To pass the time, the company, which is over a century old, unveiled its assets for the coming months in June, including a new game in the universe of the successful Zelda franchise, “Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom,” which will be released in September. However, Nintendo must “of course keep its blockbusters for the next console,” noted Mr. Toto.
This machine, about which we still know almost nothing, will be more of an “evolution” than a “revolution”, Takeshi Koyama estimated in a recent note from Mizuho Securities, emphasizing that Nintendo itself uses the term “successor to the Switch”. In particular, it should keep the hybrid model allowing you to play on a television as well as in a portable way.
Nintendo is still expecting a 24% drop in operating profit and a 20% drop in sales year-on-year in 2024/25.