Nintendo is finally coming out and talking about its Amiibo problem, and it wants you to know that it’s working on increasing the supply to better match the demand.
Amiibos are Nintendo’s interactive toys based on characters like Mario, Link, and Pikachu. Fans have gone nuts for these figures since they debuted late last year, which has caused many of the Amiibo characters to sell out at stores. In some cases, if you don’t get in line at a retail location like GameStop to preorder, you’ll have no chance of securing certain characters without going through secondary channels like eBay — and paying inflated prices. Now, Nintendo is acknowledging the problem, and it says it will work to make things easier for its fans.
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“We appreciate the enthusiasm that our fans continue to show toward amiibo. Sales for the product have exceeded our expectations. We understand how frustrating it can be at times if consumers are unable to find certain figures, and we apologize for that.
We’re trying to meet the demands of our fans and consumers by increasing the amount of amiibo we manufacture and ship to retail. We may continue to see consumer demand outpace supply levels for certain characters at times, but we will do our best to prevent that from happening.
As our library of amiibo continues to grow, some figures will be easier to find than others. We are constantly looking for the opportunity to reissue amiibo and are already making plans to bring back some currently out-of-stock amiibo figures. Stay tuned for details.
Nintendo plans to make it easier for consumers to know when new amiibo are on the way, through Nintendo press announcements, timely updates on our social media channels and working closely with retailers.
We remain committed to keeping amiibo affordable and easy to access as a platform to enhance game-play experiences. These plans include Animal Crossing amiibo cards that will become available by the end of 2015, and a free-to-download app for Wii U calledamiibo tap: Nintendo’s Greatest Bits that launched on April 30, 2015, that lets consumers enjoy playable scenes from certain NES and Super NES games with amiibo.”
Nintendo has sold around 6 million Amiibos worldwide as of February. In March, the company said it sold 3.5 million in North America alone. The idea of making interactive toys that interface with certain games (like Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and Mario Kart 8) is definitely one that people love, but this has also brought down a lot of criticism on Nintendo and its supply-chain problems.
One of the biggest complaints is that this extreme shortage forces people into a situation where they are afraid that if they don’t preorder every single character, they may run into a situation where they simply cannot find one that they actually want at a later date. After months of relative silence on this subject, today’s statement addresses that concern. Now, fans will just have to wait to see how Nintendo executes going forward.