The Nintendo Wii is about to breathe its last breath. There are a mere handful of noteworthy games coming to the console in the next few months including Xenoblade Chronicles ( in the U.S.) and Rythym Heaven Fever. After these games and Mario Party 9 release, it is time to look to the future – and for Nintendo, that is the Wii U.

This week Nintendo president Satoru Iwata has stated that the company’s new home console the Wii U will in fact launch this year in all major regions ( North America, Europe, Australia and Japan) by the holidays.  Nintendo as a company badly needs to see some serious profit after posting major losses with poor 3DS sales at launch, having to make an extreme price cut on the handheld mere months later and not having blockbuster games earlier in 2011. Scheduling Skyward Sword, Super Mario 3D Land and Mario Kart 7 so late in the year did not help make up for the poor sales that had come before.

A “final format” of the Wii U will be shown at this year’s E3 expo (this could be either a redesign to the system or its tablet controller or just some features of the console that have yet to be shown). One thing that Nintendo will also be talking about at the show will be their new online plans for the Wii U and the 3DS.

Dubbed the Nintendo Network, and already confirmed by the company this week, the network will allow players to have multiple accounts on a system and will allow ease for transfering said accounts from one system to another. Nintendo is also exploring the possibility of offering full retail games for download. They have not said when these programs will start, but it does have the ability to do so. Iwata has noted that they would need to consider their relationships with retailers and the limitations of SD card space.

It seems that Nintendo is coming into a place where they will be able to more seriously compete with their competitors in terms of online facilities. This coming fall will be an exciting time, and the fires of new information that will be stoked at E3 in June look set to feed those flames in the hearts of Nintendo fans everywhere.