Nintendo: Wii U game (not console) sales are up 10% thanks to Splatoon

Nintendo’s ink shooter has given some life to its Wii U console.

The publisher revealed that the home gaming system’s software sales are up 10 percent through the first seven months of the year compared to the same period in 2014. Games like Mario Kart 8 and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U continue to find an audience, but the surprise star is Splatoon. The home console gaming market is worth billions of dollars, and Nintendo has given up much of its share of that to its competition from Sony and Microsoft. But Splatoon is one of the few bright spots for the company as it prepares to transition into a new era — one in which it plans to embrace mobile games and release a successor to the Wii U called the NX.