TMCnet News
NINTENDO SELLS OVER 500,000 'WII' GAME CONSOLES IN S. KOREASEOUL, Apr 29, 2009 (AsiaPulse via COMTEX) -- Japanese gaming giant Nintendo Co. (TSE:7974) has sold more than 500,000 units of its popular "Wii" console in South Korea, its local unit said Wednesday. Introduced a year ago in South Korea, Wii has gained widespread appealed among gamers, especially among families with children, Nintendo Korea said. The company also said that domestic sales of its "DS Lite" portable gaming device hit more than 2.5 million units after reaching a sales milestone of two million in February. The palm-sized device was launched in South Korea in January 2007 along with Nintendo's official operations in South Korea. Popular sales of the two gaming consoles are regarded by many local tech experts as a noteworthy success in South Korea, where on-line computer games are generally more popular than console gaming. Sales of Nintendo-related software products, however, fell short of the success seen in its hardware sales. "Wii Sports," the most popular title among Wii users in South Korea, sold 210,000 units, while "New Super Mario Brothers," the most widely sold gaming title for DS Lite, barely reached 440,000 units. Mineo Koda, head of Nintendo Korea, earlier attributed the relatively lower sales of software products to what he called "rampant software piracy" in South Korea. According to a report by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the software piracy rate in South Korea stood at 23.4 per cent last year, down 1.6 per cent from a year earlier. (Yonhap) |