Nintendo console sales break European records

Wii and DS are Euro biggest sellers

15 January 2009 19:42 GMT / By Verity Burns

Nintendo has broken console sales records in Europe, with both its Wii and DS machines.

The company sold a total of 8.3 million units of the Wii console last year, making it the largest annual home console seller in European history.

Showing that the Wii continues to build upon its success, its 2008 sales show a 58% increase compared to 2007, and ups the European Wii installed base to 14.2 million units.

Nintendo's DS was also a Euro record breaker in 2008, selling over 11.2 million units - the largest annual sales figure for any games console in European history. This takes the total number of DS handhelds sold in Europe to 31 million units.

"The sales trend on both Wii and Nintendo DS, hardware and software during 2008 shows that more and more people in Europe are enjoying video games as part of their daily lives", said Nintendo of Europe MD, marketing and PR Laurent Fischer.

"This proves that Nintendo’s wish to expand the gaming population has strong potential in Europe".