Nintendo Boss Satoru Iwata on amiibo Shortage

How's the amiibo situation looking? Nintendo boss Satoru Iwata discusses the current issues with the NFC figures.

Speaking as part of a Financial Results Briefing yesterday, Iwata confirmed that amiibo shipments have tallied up to around 10.5 million units worldwide by 31st March 2015 - marking a "very strong growth" even in the period after the year-end sales season. 

Nintendo feels that fans simply "purchase additional amiibo figures without any seasonal bias, as they are relatively more affordable than video game titles."

However, despite the growing sales figures, there have been stock shortages on a global scale, often selling through days after launch - or in many cases being unavailable to buy on day one.

Iwata admitted that "we can't promise at what point we will likely be able to resolve the current situation because figures such as these require a considerable amount of time to produce, store shelf space is limited and it is difficult to precisely predict the exact amount of overall demand."

The company can predict further sales growth, though.

Interestingly, the biggest shipment of amiibo figures at the moment is the US + Canada, followed closely by Europe, Iwata confirmed.

Going forward, Nintendo will be releasing amiibo cards, a dedicated NFC reader/writer for older 3DS consoles, plus a new game to be compatible with the cards: Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer.

Which amiibo characters do you have in your line-up?