At the tip of its fiscal year in March, Nintendo announced to the sector that it had sold 3.45 million Wii U units since its launch last November. Most of these units were sold in the course of the holiday season, however, as Nintendo had only sold 200,000 units within the first three months of this year. Within the three months since April, it’s gotten even worse.

In its first quarter earnings report, Nintendo says that it’s only sold 160,000 Wii U units worldwide between April and June. Throughout the same period, it only sold 1.03 million Wii U software units. It’s painfully obvious that sales are slowing down for Nintendo’s new console, and things are looking grim.

So, what does Nintendo blame this poor performance on? Clone of everybody else, the corporate cites “the release of few key first-party titles this quarter.” If you happen to check out the last quarter, Nintendo only released three first party titles – LEGO City Undercover, New Super Luigi U and Game & Wario. Out of all of these, only 1 (New Super Luigi U) has any mainstream appeal. Unfortunately for Nintendo, prematurely announcing the physical release of what was to be a digital download will have hurt its current sales as Wii U owners look forward to that release as opposed to buying the title at the eShop.

It appears like Nintendo’s in a foul spot. The corporate does have a technique to spur Wii U sales though. It plans to finally release some games for the console:

For the ‘Wii U’ system, we’ll try to think about proactively releasing key first-party titles from the second one half this year through next year to regain momentum for the platform. Starting with ‘Pikmin 3,’ which was released in Japan and Europe in July and can be released within the Usa in August, we plan on releasing key titles reminiscent of ‘The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD,’ ‘Wii Party U,’ ‘Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze,’ ‘Super Mario 3D World,’ and ‘Wii Fit U.’

Moreover, Nintendo strives to enhance the sales by communicating the compelling nature of our hardware and software to as almost all people as possible through our new network service called ‘Miiverse,’ which offers an atmosphere where people can empathize with others and share their gaming experiences. We also strive to enhance hardware profitability by reducing its costs.

The finest bit concerning the above statement is how Nintendo plans to work Miiverse into its strategy. Wii U owners can now access Miiverse on the internet, but they need to have a Wii U to make an account. It plans on releasing Miiverse for the 3DS later this year, nevertheless it also needs to work on releasing dedicated apps for mobile devices to boot. Allowing people to have interaction with the Wii U community might just convince them to purchase one.

Even if it’s strategy proves successful, Nintendo will still need to take care of the approaching launch of the Xbox One and PS4. Current reports show both Microsoft and Sony increasing component orders and stores selling out of initial allotments. Each of the signs points to consumers jumping onto a better-gen bandwagon in a tremendous way. Nintendo must somehow convince these consumers that the Wii U is no less than a worthy complementary console with experiences that you just can’t find anywhere else.

[h/t: Kotaku]