A legit thread being flamed? wtf Vgchartz.

OT: Anyways imo the panic pricecut Nintendo did after 5 months pretty much masked the real numbers a regular handheld would do. Thus the peak year was very early and we might see another peak year after another pricecut. But for the years without pricecuts, it may just be "mediocre" as compared with the peak years.

It is indeed an informed prediction when he is using comparing and using the wrong data.

How funny. Shipments from Nintendo are wrong, figures from VGC where they overtracked the 3DS in Nov in the US 400k+ are accurate.

You're comparing the wrong data. You're comparing 2Q of their fiscal year and then you're saying that they need to ship another 9m+ units before the end of december. Their FY ends on the 31st march. 

To give you an idea, they usually ship around 8M 3DS systems in their 3rd quarters (going with FY 13 and 12). They will most certainly surpass their shipments of FY 13. 

EDIT: Might have read the OP wrong, but my point still stands that 3DS will easily surpass 15M units.

What?! Calendar year dude, calendar year. I count 3 Q's in the OP, and use sold through data and my predictions to come up with a range for Q4, Obviously you disagree with those predictions, that's fine. We'll see in January. If they ship under the previous 2 years, then to investors and anything/one that matters, they're down YoY. What is shown here is largely irrelevent.

I think you're on to something, if we look at it shipments for each calendar year, Nintendo shipped more in 2011 than 2012. If we look at the Fiscal Year shipments, 2011 and 2012 were practically the equal.

Anyways, since the OP uses shipments in each calendar year wouldn't the title be "Lowest shipment year..." be more appropiate. Also, shouldn't the numbers look like this:
Shipped:
15.04m - 2011
14.81m - 2012
5.13m - 2013(ending Sep 30)
=34.98m LtD shipped as of Sep 30 (Nintendo's own numbers)

Where did the 14.58m for 2011 come from? It gets kinda confusing using Calendar year with Fiscal Year numbers.

I think we should switch to fiscal year numbers 'cuz it's what Nintendo uses.
FY10 – 3.61m
FY11 – 13.53m
FY12 – 13.98m
FY13 – 3.89m
Or quarterly:
FY: ------Q1-----Q2-----Q3------Q4
'10:    ------ ,  -------  ,  ------- ,  3.61m
'11:  0.70m – 2.37m – 8.36m - 2.10m
'12:  1.86m – 3.20m – 7.65m - 1.24m
'13:  1.40m – 2.49m, ------- , -------

If we go by Calendar year, 2013 looks really bad. Right now it looks like 3DS is doing okay. So, perhaps it is better to look at Fiscal Year numbers. Q1, Jan-Mar (Q4 FY12), is really holding 2013 down. If we go by Fiscal calendar, 2013 is still down, but not too bad. There's still Q3 and Q4 to go. Can Nintendo shipped ~9.5-10m in Q3-Q4 to be within range of '11 and '12? Idk, JP sales have slowed down, but it looks like NA and EU are picking up.

Cheebee said: Hmm. Whether 3DS ends up hitting its target or not, it's going to end up having sold -insanely- well this year. Looks like 2011, 2012 and 2013 will end up being incredibly similar in sales. 3 Peak years in a row, eh? Nice.

Those were peak years? I guess it'll sell about as much as the PSP in the end.

I think a lot of that comes down to overstepping from last year, but still...it is slightly concerning. I mean, the system is selling well, but with Pokemon, Monster Hunter and other big games I expected sales to be higher.

But that definitely doesn't mean it's doing badly.

It still makes no sense. How can they just ship 34,98m lifetime if the retail sales reach 39+m lifetime ? Where are the 5 million missing? Overtracking? No way. 

End. Of. September.