Nintendo is still faltering despite Mario Kart 8 success

It was once the video game powerhouse, but now Nintendo is still suffering financial woes.

While sales of both the Wii U console and the Mario Kart 8 game have been strong, they have not been enough to pull the company out of its four-year slump.

Nintendo this week revealed its financial results for the first quarter of 2014.

The company said that it sold 510,000 Wii U units and 820,000 3DS units, but that was not enough to stop it from suffering a financial loss.

Nintendo reported its net income was in the red by ¥9.92 billion (£54.7m).

While it rebounded a bit from a loss of ¥17.19bn in Q3 of 2012 to a gain of ¥8.62bn in Q3 of 2013, the Japanese game-maker’s operating income loss of ¥4.9bn in Q3 of 2012 nearly doubled to ¥9.47bn in the latest quarter.

Mario Kart 8 did give Nintendo and the Wii U a much-needed boost.

The popular go-karting game has sold 2.82m copies since its launch on May 30.

Meanwhile, NintendoLife is reporting that the UK supermarket chain Sainsburys has cut retail price of the Wii U Mario Kart 8 hardware bundle by £40, to £209.99.

But will that result in enough of a sales boost to turn Nintendo’s fortunes around?