Nintendo Back in Black, but Halves Full-Year Forecast

Japanese video game icon Nintendo turned in a solid holiday quarter and reiterated today that it expects this fiscal year to be its first profitable one since 2012 — but it slashed its profit forecasts for that year from $339 million (40 billion yen) to $169 million (20 billion yen).

It was Nintendo’s second consecutive quarter in the black, with sales of $2.3 billion (272 billion yen) versus $2.9 billion (303 billion yen)* in the same quarter in 2013. Profits in that same time period rose from $206 million (22 billion yen) in the holiday quarter of 2013 to $269 million (32 billion yen) in 2014.

Although it was expected that Amiibo, plastic toys of game characters that can interact with certain games like Mario Kart 8 and Super Smash Bros., would lift the company’s profits, Nintendo did not specifically attribute its holiday results to the toys. Amiibo sales numbers were not disclosed, but the game with which they were designed to have the greatest functionality — Super Smash Bros. for the Wii U — has sold 3.39 million units worldwide since its November debut.

Update: A Nintendo spokesperson says the company has sold nearly 5.7 million Amiibo figures to date.

On the hardware front, Nintendo said it moved nearly five million units of its handheld console, the 3DS, in the past three months, bringing the global total sold since 2011 to more than 50 million. As in the past, the strongest 3DS sales came from Japan, boosted by the launch of a new iteration of the hardware that is scheduled to launch in the U.S. next month.

The company sold 1.91 million units of its home console, the Wii U, in the holiday quarter, and three million total since April 2014. That’s a slight dip from the 2013 holiday quarter, when it sold 1.95 million Wii Us. Life-to-date sales of the console are now 9.2 million.

* Exchange rates have been adjusted for historical values.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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