Nintendo says it'll sell 20M Switch consoles in the next year
The Japanese gaming giant is selling a whole lot of Switch consoles -- just under 18 million, in fact -- and expects to sell even more over the coming year.
The Switch has been a momentous comeback for Nintendo after the whole Wii U fiasco, and the company says the party is just getting started.
Sales for the console are up to 17.79 million as of March 31, according to the company's latest earnings report. Nintendo is forecasting that it'll sell an additional 20 million units this fiscal year -- and 100 million games.
For a point of reference, Nintendo's previous home console, the Wii U, has a total lifetime sales count of 13.5 million, with 102 million software units sold. The company's most successful hardware endeavor was the Wii, which sold just over 100 million units.
Key to that will be the recently unveiled Smash Bros. game. The earnings report also noted that a traditional Pokemon RPG, which was announced at last year's E3, will be released in "2018 or later." The fact that 2018 is listed as a possibility is significant, as there are two other games (Bayonetta 3, Metroid Prime 4) with a release window of "TBA."
Nintendo also announced that president Tatsumi Kimishima will retire on June 28. Kimishima became president after the 2015 passing of Satoru Iwata. He'll be replaced by 42-year-old(!) Shuntaro Furukawa.