Nintendo bucks seasonal sales trend, says Fils-Aime

Nintendo claims that its new hardware is managing to break the traditional videogame sales cycle where top titles only sell well during busy holiday periods.

Sales of videogames usually slump across the board during the post-Christmas period, and then again after Easter and through the summer months, to pick up again in November and December.

But Reggie Fils-Aime, president of Nintendo of America, says that sales of hit titles such as Nintendogs and Brain Training prove that it's possible to continue to shift units outside of gift-buying seasons.

"Games that appeal to a wider audience can stay on the best seller list indefinitely," said Fils-Aime during the company's media summit, reports Wired.

According to the US boss, Nintendo has seen "change in the perennial post-holiday time period. Everyone knows that more than half of our revenues are generated in November and December, and software sales go in the doldrums in the next quarter after the holidays."

However, Fils-Aime revealed that Nintendogs and Brain Training have been in the top 25 best-selling games in the US since release over 21 months ago.

"We believe that as the market widens we shouldn't be so dependent on the holidays," he said.

Fils-Aime also revealed a number of sales and usage figures for the Wii and DS hardware.

According to Nintendo, 40 per cent of Wii owners are using the console to connect to the internet and so far over 3.3 million titles have been downloaded via the Virtual Console service.

In the US, the number of people aged over 30 purchasing the DS has risen by 127 per cent, while over 35 years of age that figure rises to 212 per cent.