Nintendo confirms a worldwide 2012 release for the Wii U

Following Nintendo's release of its third quarter earnings, head honcho Satoru Iwata reassured that Nintendo was releasing the Wii U by the end of this year. While many people assumed this to be a surefire thing, Iwata confirmed it will be released in every major territory by the end of the year as well. Check out the news below.

Nintendo unveiled its eight generation game console, the Wii U, at E3 last year. When it was first revealed, Nintendo was rather vague on its release window other than from April of 2012 to the end of that year. Nintendo currently has plans to reunveil the Wii U at this years' E3 in June, perhaps to make up for the flakey initial reveal in regards to features, what the system will launch with and how Nintendo's mysterious online service will work. Nintendo's new target for release will be the holiday season of this year, so perhaps the company wants to follow the pattern made with the Wii. Before the Wii, Nintendo's consoles would normally launch in some region before the holidays, potentially creating a smaller window of sales compared to the absurd holiday rush many consumer products aim for at the end of the year.

Nintendo aims to stop the streak of decline in terms of its profitability and hopes to use the resurgance of the 3DS and the release of the Wii U at the end of this year to turn back to profitability. Nintendo has lowered its third quarter projections and even expects a major loss of $893 million dollars. Not as much of a loss as the company  had last year when it was expected to lose over $1 billion dollars, but it's still a big hit to the company that made a warchest with the DS and Wii.

Personally, I'm a little skeptical on the Wii U. The controller seems to lack that wow factor in terms of a surprise we as gamers got with the Wii and the DS. In fact, this is a lot like the 3DS: it seems like an expansion to an existing premise. Whereas the 3DS seems like a direct evolution of the DS with the new feature of 3D, the Wii U seems like an evolution of the Wii now in HD, and embracing elements of the DS with the tablet screen. There are also risks of a chance of brand confusion. Sure, core gamers will be able to differentiate between a Wii U and a Wii, but will a noninformed casual gamer? Some got the idea that the Wii U was nothing but a tablet, and that was solely with Nintendo's reveal of the new platform. There's still a minor issue with some consumers that the 3DS is just another version of the DS, too. In the end though, the system needs software to sell the hardware, and Nintendo knows this especially with the slow launch sales of the 3DS. If Nintendo wants to persuade me and other games to get on board with its new platform, especially considering the painful drought of games in 2011 on Wii, the team needs to have a launch that fires on all cylinders to persuade us. And I'd surely be an easy guy to please: Just release Pikmin 3 already! Please?!

Sources: Reuters, Nintendo

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