The official release date for the Wii U may have just been leaked during a presentation by gaming accessory-maker PDP at a GameStop managers’ conference in Texas.
A rep for PDP was showing the company’s upcoming line-up and wrapped by saying the peripherals would be available just ahead of the Wii U’s November 18 release date, according to an attendee at the conference who asked to remain anonymous. A similar account, by a different person, was posted on the NeoGAF message board.
The Wii U release date is not supposed to be public yet and will presumably be made official, along with the machine’s price at a major New York City even on September 13.
“They changed the subject real quickly once they realised what they said,” our source said.
The November 18 date fits Nintendo’s probable plan. The company prefers to launch major hardware and games on Sundays, as they did this past August 19 with the Nintendo 3DS XL and New Super Mario Bros. 2. Nintendo launched their previous consoles, the Wii and the GameCube, on Sundays as well — Sundays in November. This possible Wii U date, November 18, 2012, is also the final November Sunday before Thanksgiving in the US and the big shopping bonanza that is Black Friday. It’s doubtful Nintendo would consider a release date much later than that.
A November 18 release date would also put the Wii U in stores after major marketing pushes earlier in the month for the Xbox-360-only Halo 4 (November 4) and the multi-platform Call of Duty Black Ops II (November 13).
We’ve reached out to PDP and Nintendo for comment and will let you know if we hear back.
UPDATE: PDP community manager Candace Hinton tells Kotaku that “at this time we can’t confirm Nintendo’s dates and we don’t know exactly what was heard, but we simply do not know that this point. We are launching accessories, but the date for the accessories doesn’t mean a confirmation on the hardware. If you seek confirmation on the date that is something that is going to need to go specifically though Nintendo, but we can’t confirm or deny dates on any of their hardware.”
UPDATE 2: A rep for Nintendo says: “We have nothing to announce at this time.”
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