For awhile, it seemed as though Nintendo's ship might be sinking very quickly. The company was slow to adopt digital gaming trends, and this hurt overall profits for some time. Now, Nintendo is reporting a rise in sales with its 3DS console.

Nintendo has recently decided to concentrate 3DS efforts towards online purchases in addition to other purchases. This decision is slowly paying off for the company. Nintendo is now reporting that 67% of 3DS users connect their handhelds to the Internet. That number results in millions of downloads.

Users Want Digital

Nintendo's new numbers clearly point towards one thing: gamers want digital access. Downloading games from the Internet is the one thing that gamers really want to do now. Nintendo missed out on this marketshare in the beginning, but now the company is starting to see the larger (digital) picture.

It's not that gamers didn't like the 3DS, it's that people want digital download access. Now that Nintendo has granted that access, 3DS sales are up by nearly 55%. That's a huge deal for Nintendo, a company that was nearly out of the loop for a long time. Clearly, Nintendo's 3DS console isn't a bad thing at all, but Nintendo's choice to skip digital downloads was a bad one.

Wii U Sales Rise Too

Nintendo's Wii U is also doing better than anticipated. With Internet connectivity, the Wii U has become popular once more. While not succeeding quite as much as the 3DS, the Wii U is a console that gamers still enjoy. This week, Nintendo will be releasing a number of new Wii U games in anticipation of the upcoming E3 Expo.

Still, many Nintendo fans are calling for the company to export games to Android and iOS. Fans, it seems, wants Nintendo games just as much as they ever did, but they want those games at their fingertips. Today, everyone's fingertips seem to be settling on an Android or iOS device, and that's where Nintendo may be focusing the company's efforts in the future. Then again, the 3DS has hit a nice stride, so we'll see where that goes.

The Touchscreen Trouble

It's quite possible that Nintendo is working on some touchscreen issues related to exporting games too. Many push-button games simply don't work that well when exported to touch-screen, and Nintendo doesn't want to export a bunch of games that are mediocre. Logically, the company will probably create a new batch of games that have been specifically designed for touch screens.

Can a system game go directly to iOS or Android without any real hiccups? It doesn't seem very likely, but it's a step that Nintendo will have to consider. Fans simply want iOS and Android games as well as console games, and this isn't something that Nintendo should sidestep. Right now, the company has to take advantage of what gamers want, and that, clearly, is more digital access. For now, it really doesn't seem like Nintendo is going anywhere -- despite earlier predictions from around the web!