Nintendo has cut its sales forecasts for flagship devices, including the newly launched Wii U console.

The Japanese video games-maker said it was expecting to sell 4m Wii Us in the current financial year, down from a previous estimate of 5.5m.

The figures were released in a quarterly financial update that Yasuo Sakuma, portfolio manager at Bayview Asset Management, described as "a somewhat negative surprise".

The Wii U was launched in November as Nintendo's latest attempt to keep ahead of the smartphones and tablets that have transformed the competitive landscape for games since the first version of the Wii appeared in 2006.

The original Wii revolutionised gaming, allowing users to play simulated sports such as golf and tennis by making real-life movements rather than by pressing buttons.

By contrast, the Wii U has not been heralded as marking such a big change, despite new features such as the GamePad controller, which incorporates a touchscreen, a camera and stereo speakers.

Nintendo sold more than 3m Wii Us by the end of December, including the crucial Christmas period, but is now expecting fewer than 1m further sales between January and the end of March, when its financial year ends.

Sales of games for Wii U devices would now total 16m for the year, not 24m as previously predicted, the maker of Super Mario and Pokémon games said in the update.

Other consoles are now expected to shift fewer units than forecast at the last quarterly update in October.

Nintendo expects to sell 4m of the earlier generation of Wii devices in the year to the end of March, down from the 5m predicted in October. Total sales of the Wii since its launch in late 2006 have now reached 99m.

Nintendo's estimate for this year's sales of the 3DS device, which was launched two years ago, has slipped from 17.5m to 15m.

Sales of the longer established DS console are likely to come in at 2.3m rather than the 2.5m forecast in October.

As a result, Nintendo predicted total sales of ¥810bn (£5.63bn) for the year, down from October's forecast of ¥670bn.

It said it would post an operating loss of ¥20bn rather than a profit of the same amount, which it had predicted.

But its predicted net profit has more than doubled, from the ¥6bn predicted in October to ¥14bn. The company says it is benefiting from the weakening of the yen against the euro and the US dollar.

Nintendo said it had returned to the black for the first nine months of its financial year.

The company reported profits of ¥14.55bn in the nine months between April and December compared with a ¥48.35bn loss in the same period in 2011.

Sales in the period slipped 2.4% to ¥543bn.