Asda vows to quit selling the WiiU

So I'm from North America so I haven't heard of Adsa but apparently they are a large UK based Grocery chain and a rather large store chain at that in the UK. And they have apparently just dropped all support for the WiiU. They will still continue selling the Xbox 360 and PS3 consoles however. This...is pretty crazy that a major retail chain drops entire support for a console. I know we all want to be positive here but...does retailers starting to drop support for the WiiU harken the end of the console? Article below:

Customers wanting to buy the machine from the supermarket can still order it online and have it delivered to their homes or to a local store for pick-up.

Asda said rival consoles, Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3, would still be sold in-store.

This is despite the fact that the Wii U is the newest of the devices having only been launched in November.

The news comes as the Japanese firm revealed that it sold 160,000 Wii U consoles worldwide in its April-to-June quarter - a drop of more than 50% on the previous period.

The device was actually outsold by the six-year-old original Wii which shifted 210,000 units.

Delayed games

The Wii U had been available in about 100 of Asda's 568 stores, but a spokesman for the Wal-Mart owned chain denied the withdrawal was a sign of waning confidence in Nintendo.

"We continue to support Nintendo as a partner," he said

He added that Asda had recently expanded the space allocated to sell Nintendo's 3DS XL and games for the handheld console.

In May, games giant EA said it had stopped developing new games for the Wii U, and Nintendo's company results revealed that sales targets for the console had fallen well below expectations.

Nintendo has blamed disappointing sales on the delayed release of key games, but says new titles, such as a 3D version of the long-running Super Mario series expected this Christmas, should help revive the Wii U's fortunes.

In its latest earnings statement the firm left its Wii U sales forecast unchanged, predicting nine million of the devices would be sold over its current financial year. - Source

The joke is on Asda, the Wii U already quit selling all by itself.

ASDA is Walmart, same company.

Not a very big place for buying games though, they rise in popularity when the 24 hour stores allow you to buy releases at midnight.

I'm not surprised. The numbers Nintendo put out today are atrocious. 10k in EU and Australia combined.

The Wii U seems to be in a bleak state right now. I hope things pick up for it when Nintendo finally gets around to releasing some games.

Sears (at least in eastern Canada) used to sell game consoles in the PS1/N64 era. Then they stopped when the PS2 came around since their typical customer wasn't buying. Then the Wii came along and they jumped back into the games business. Now that the Wii has dropped off they've dropped games again (including PS3/360 but based on shelf space it seemed like Nintendo was their biggest seller). Is this Adsa situation possibly a case of this particular companies core market not overlapping with the WiiU market? Then it makes sense to drop it. Still doesn't sound good but it might not be as bad as it sounds (especially for us foreigners).

The thing is, even if it releases some great games that meet my preferences, will I still have the time and interest and money to spare for them? By the time Nintendo gets their asses into gear in regards to Wii U games, both the Xbox One and Playstation 4 will be on the market, with the full support of third parties and indipendent developers.

Personally, I'll have my hands full indefinitely with new generation games on PS4 and PC, and it would take one hell of a title, something akin to what Demon's Souls was for PS3 - wildly original, hitting my niche, an absolute must play game both on paper and on video - to get me to even consider getting a Wii U. Pikmin 3, Wonderful 101, Marioland 3D, Mario Kart 8, Super Smash Brothers Wii U, Bayonetta 2 are not it.

Nintendo will have to sacrifice lots of their reserves to keep supporting the Wii U and save face, and maybe create a marginally sustainable market by doing so in another couple of years. However it simply cannot become a success anymore at this point. Unthinkable.

I just wonder how many years Nintendo has to stick by the Wii U, before it's acceptable for them to move on to their next home platform. Super Wii U HD in 2015? Closing the gap to PS4 and Xbox One computing power wise? An improved Wii U tablet with multitouch? A competitive online inclusion and marketplace? Shifting the focus from family and kids soley, to include those of us who enjoy more *adult* games like The Last of Us?

I guess Nintendo could not compete with a *Mee Too* business model, being the company that it is, but exactly what can it do at this point? The handheld market is shifting to everpresent smartphones and tablets, home consoles face a technological shift, and face an uncertain future, having to deal with emergent business models such as free to play and various means of online distribution.

I just don't see how Nintendo can become successful again, facing these challenges and circumstances. I think Nintendo is done. Unless the nature of Nintendo changes (as in getting bought by another corporation, such as Disney), I say Nintendo's goose is cooked.

@mosespippy: I dunno Pachter on twitter seemed pretty blown away by it.

Sorry to hear sales are so bad across the board for the U. Of course, Nintendo made a lot more mistakes with it than just launching before the key selling games were set to be completed. I will never understand the rationale behind launching a system equivalent to the processing power of current gen systems, at the very end of said current gen, with no particular advantages over competing current gen consoles on their way out. They made a system that was going to be obsolete within a year of launch,.

I think Nintendo might be wise to bow out of the console market and put everything they have into handhelds. Despite competition from phone and tablet games, I think there is still a significant market for dedicated handheld games systems.

Nintendo needs to get the price down around 200 bucks if it wants to have a chance, if they go hard and bundle the hell out of it this Holiday they might have a chance at being the best value which might ship a ton of units. Not sure if thats profitable for them though.

l live in Scotland and people don't know that the Wii U exists and they are the people who made the Wii successful.

Whuh!. I wonder what it would take for Wal-Mart and Sam's to drop Wii U.

"The year 2013 marked the beginning of the end for Nintendo as a major player in the video games business, a year infamously known as 'The Year of Luigi'"

3DS goals were too high, and the Wii U numbers are pathetic, there doesn't seem to be a big must-have game coming out anytime soon, and a couple other consoles launch this year. Nintendo's looking in rough shape. I hope there's a price drop before the fall, I really want to play Sonic Lost World.

Nintendo really dropped the ball with the Wii U. I can't see them recovering this gen.

10 year old Zelda Remake will save the Wii U, right?

Since they're the same company as wal-mart, probably not much.

This is what happens when you squander a whole year being out ahead. Nintendo really can't do much until a few months after Xbox One and PS4 come out. People love new shiny things and will focus on them for awhile.

I mean I work for Target and they've already canned the Basic Wii-U model at our store. We just have a whole strip for Deluxes now. News like this makes me really interested in how our Electronics section is going to be shuffled up for 2 new consoles.

Although the funny part is that we still sell and regularly get PSP-3000's. So who knows.

Yeah, big box stores like Walmart have so much inventory of miscellaneous crap all over the store in every department, a lot of which probably only sells a couple units per month, that it would shock me to see them outright drop a failing console that people still come in to buy even just occasionally.

I haven't bought a game from ASDA since they stopped undercutting everyone else.

This is probably way more indicative of the rise of buying online than anything else. I could buy a Wii U tomorrow and have it delivered the next morning for £10-£20 cheaper with free P&P if I so wished. But I don't wish because the Wii U has no gaemz. Nintendo got too comfortable with the Wii and forgot to release big games at or near launch. Same thing happened with the 3DS but they sorted themselves out and it's the only console I play now.

Don't worry guys, they'll realize how bad they fucked up once Wind Waker HD rolls around.

@bigjeffrey said:

I still don't understand how people are excited for a game they've more than likely already completed once or how they expect it to save the WiiU.

Well, this'll be a real kick in the pants for Nintendo, but I stand by my fruitless optimism towards the Wii U as a system, if only because I usually end up playing most multiplatform games on the pc anyway.

I see what you mean. To be honest, there's not really anything I'm that excited about for the Wii U besides Windwaker Hd, but I can already play that game if I really wanted to. It's very possible Nintendo will go the way of Sega, and I can't say that'd be a bad thing either. I know people always say never underestimate Nintendo, but we'll see.

They mean 'stocking', right?

Topic title makes it sound like ASDA is a wino swearing off the booze.

But yeah, this sounds bad. Hope Nintendo can turn the Wii U around, but there hasn't been positive news for a while.

Haven't seen figures but I don't think Asda shift many units of any console in the UK. They aim for being the cheapest supermarket around and tend to be the favourite place to get food etc for students, those on low income and so on. They are popular, and offer good deals, but I can't imagine they have tons of people rocking up looking to spend hundreds of pounds on electronics. Could be wrong, but I don't think this impacts Nintendo much, if at all. Maybe if Sainsbury's or Tesco's does the same then it's an indication that non gaming-specific companies are ditching the machine here.

Not that I'm saying all is well in WiiU land of course. Hell no.

@demoskinos said:

Does that mean that they expect to sell 8.8 million Wii U units over the next 9 months? That seems like a really lofty goal at this point, even with a new Mario game coming out.

It's come full circle.

While Nintendo will be fine as a whole, they have so much cash in reserve its ridiculous and the 3DS continues to sell well. Hopefully they make a price cut and that Mario Kart factor will kick in 2014 and start boosting the sales. They should be pushing the virtual console also they seem to be slow to updating it. While it will not be a 70 million seller it could still sell 20-30 mill if sales pick up.