Nintendo France's Philippe Lavoue recently spoke with Gamekult and revealed some very interesting things.
, Nintendo is seeing pre-orders similar to those of Wii in France with Switch and expects to sell 800,000 units this year, aka the lifetime sales of Wii U. They are planning on 95,000 units on day one with a near 100 percent conversion rate with Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Surprisingly compared to North America, the gray bundle is currently more popular than the neon Joy Con Option.
Lavoue said he thinks things will ultimately shift in the opposite direction with the Switch than has been with the Wii U. He discussed in how the system is taking them in the right direction. He noted that from a financial perspective, Nintendo just couldn’t include 1-2 Switch in the package but the game by itself is a good game to get. Nintendo would have loved to bring a pack in game with the Switch but that would have just made things more expensive. He did however state, that Zelda: Breath of the Wild being “exceptional” will help the Switch at launch.
When the subject of Wii U came up, Lavoue commented that the Wii U's gimmick of being able to take a game with you around a room wasn’t enough. Asymmetric gameplay, while a nice idea, was very difficult to get across and cost them in the end.
He was quick to point out that Mario Kart Wii sold three million copies in France while Mario Kart 8 is at roughly 350,000 and he doesn't see an issue with Zelda being on both systems since pre-orders on Wii U aren’t close at all to Switch. Therefore the Switch is in a strong position in terms of sales.
He then went on to state that regarding 3DS, he believes users of the handheld shouldn’t worry with Switch coming into the picture. He noted that the first half of 2017’s lineup is better than last year. Lastly he stated he thinks three million 3DS games as well as 700,000 systems will be sold at a minimum this year.
Source- http://bit.ly/2kYXbha
