Earlier last year, many people considered Nintendo doomed, myself included! The 3DS suffered from an awful launch that led to a steep price cut mid-way through the year that is now only beginning to show it’s significance. The Wii U, Nintendo’s upcoming console, also wasn’t received very well as many were even confused as to what the heck it even was!

Nintendo was racing for better results in an effort to save the future of their company. CEO, Satoru Iwata, personally took a 50% price cut from his salary, which was roughly $1.7 million per year! The pay cuts are ostensibly part of Nintendo management “taking responsibility” for poor 3DS sales.

“The current situation,” Iwata said when asked about the 3DS’ slow sales, “resulted from the fact that the delay of developing Nintendo 3DS software and launching online services, like Nintendo eShop, 3D video services and so forth, occurred simultaneously, so we could not meet people’s high expectations that they had before its launch, and we did not see momentum after the launch.”

However, Nintendo was quick to respond to the 3DS price drop backlash. The gaming giant was quick to restore it’s relationship with the many consumers who got burned by the discount with a formal apology and promise of 20 free virtual console games.

The problem that still remained however was that the 3DS still didn’t have any games worth buying. Not many developers were eager to jump on board after seeing the poor performance of the system. Especially after the skeptical sounding Circle Pad Pro was announced. The Circle Pad Pro ($20) is an extension to the 3DS that adds an extra analog stick with three more shoulder buttons. This puts developers in a place where they now have to develop games for both the standard edition of the 3DS and/or use with the Circle Pad Pro. I don’t think that sounds very motivating.

Many began questioning Nintendo about maybe developing their own phone, or perhaps developing for iOS since their hardware was under performing. Iwata responded, “If we did this, Nintendo would cease to be Nintendo. Having a hardware development team in-house is a major strength. It’s the duty of management to make use of those strengths. It’s probably the correct decision in the sense that the moment we started to release games on smartphones we’d make profits. However, I believe my responsibility is not to short term profits, but to Nintendo’s mid and long term competitive strength.”

That out of the picture, Nintendo entered the fall with a very timid mindset. Almost everything was resting on the upcoming lineup of games. If they failed to succeed, the 3DS might as well be considered a “dead thing of the past.” This lineup was Star Fox 64 3D, Pokemon Rumble Blast, and Tetris, followed by two huge first party titles, Mario Kart 7 and Super Mario 3D Land.

The lineup proved to be a huge success, Mario Kart 7 and Super Mario 3D Land racking up a total of one million units sold in the United States, a new milestone for the company! Holiday sales for Christmas also brought in a new surge of buyers, probably eager to get their hands on the new games. Nintendo stated that the 3DS sold a whopping total of 4 million units in the U.S. just nine months after it’s launch, which is more than the Wii did.

Speaking of the Wii, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword surpassed one million units sold as well, marking itself as the fastest selling Zelda game of all time! Nintendo also said that Mario Kart Wii had surpassed eleven million units sold and that New Super Mario Bros. on the DS has crossed ten million.

The strong finish to the year is the big push Nintendo needed to get things back on track for the new year. Wii software skyrocketed and thanks to Mario, 3DS sales shot out of the roof. Now, all sights point to the Wii U. Many questions still need answers and from what we saw at E3 last year, the Wii U still has a long way too go if it wants to be any real improvement over it’s predecessor; or even compete with the next generation of consoles.