Sales of Nintendo's Wii U have slowed due to people's misconception that the console is simply a peripheral for the Wii, as well as the long gaps between first-party game releases, global president Satoru Iwata said in the company's recent financial results briefing.
Iwata said Nintendo has been unable to successfully demonstrate the value of the platform to its consumers, "which has been a grand challenge" for Nintendo. He also said the intervals of time between Nintendo's key titles have "been so much longer than we expected" that the company has been unable to maintain "momentum" for the console.
"Some have the misunderstanding that Wii U is just Wii with a pad for games, and others even consider Wii U GamePad as a peripheral device connectable to Wii," said Iwata. "We feel deeply responsible for not having tried hard enough to have consumers understand the product."
Iwata said Nintendo will make a greater effort to help consumers understand the console and bulk up its software lineup. Nintendo plans to "intensively launch" key titles throughout the rest of year to help the Wii U regain its sale momentum, beginning with Pikmin 3 on July 13 in Japan and Aug. 4 in North America.
"As a decisive factor in buying a console is that you cannot play a much-anticipated title without the hardware, we will do our best to have you feel from this summer to the end of this year that there are plenty of great games for Wii U," Iwata said.
The company will share more information on upcoming titles and release dates at E3. Last night the company announced it would do so in smaller focused events and would forgo its annual E3 press conference.