Wii U closed out 2014 with its most successful month of sales ever.

Loading

Loading

Nintendo didn't release full sales numbers for hardware, but they did say the Wii U sold 29% better in 2014 than it did in 2013, thanks largely to December sales.On the games front, Mario Kart 8 sold over 1.7 million units, and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U sold over 1.3 million units in 2014. Those numbers represent both physical and digital sales, and they contributed to a huge 75% increase in total software sales over 2013.“Wii U had its strongest year yet thanks to the highly anticipated software lineup and the introduction of the amiibo platform,” said Nintendo of America's Scott Moffitt. “Fans can anticipate another strong year for 2015, especially with more highly anticipated games like Splatoon and The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D, as well as New Nintendo 3DS XL, arriving in the first half of 2015.”In 2014, the total sales of amiibo figures were "nearly twice" the sales for Super Smash Bros. for Wii U. Using the numbers above, that means somewhere under 2.6 million Amiibo units were sold.On the handheld side, Super Smash Bros for Nintendo 3DS led Nintendo to its most successful month ever for first-party 3DS software sales. Smash 3DS sold over 2 million copies, and Pokemon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire have sold a combined 2.6 million units.In a recent Nintendo Direct , the company revealed new 3DS and 3DS XL release dates, new amiibo news, and more.

Brian is an associate editor at IGN. You can follow him @albinoalbert on Twitter.