It would have been very difficult for Nintendo Co Ltd to top the success of the Wii, which sold more than 100 million units over the course of its lifetime, but not only has the Wii U failed to top its incredibly popular predecessor, it has not even been particularly successful among its current competitors.

According to Nintendo, the Wii U had sold roughly 12.8 million units by the end of March, placing it far behind the current market leader, PlayStation 4, which according to Sony Corp had sold over 35.7 units by January.

In a recent interview, GameStop Corp CEO Paul Raines admitted that sales of the Wii U has been a disappointment all around, for both retailers and Nintendo itself, but he also says that he has faith in the company and its place in the gaming industry.

“Wii U was disappointing to everybody, including them,” Raines said. “They made some bold bets, and maybe some of them didn’t work out. But they have a lot of creativity there. They’re a very innovative group of people, so we never count out Nintendo.”

“Even now it’s incredible how strong some of their IP is—Pokémon, for example. We could have a Pokémon weekend this weekend at GameStop and we would break sales records just because every time they put out a new game they have a very loyal fan base. Super Mario, Zelda, all those IPs have a huge, loyal fan base.”

There has been speculation for years that Nintendo might eventually go the route of Sega Games Co Ltd, which stopped producing game consoles after the failure of the Sega Dreamcast. Since then, Sega has shifted entirely toward making games rather than hardware.

However, with Nintendo expected to reveal its next console by the end of the year, it does  not look like the company has any intention of getting out of the console making business anytime soon, and even if the Wii U has not performed particularly well compared to the Wii or to PlayStation, 12.8 million units sold in just over three years is still an impressive feat.

Image courtesy of Nintendo Co Ltd