Nintendo profits on console craze

The Nintendo DS is the most popular handheld machine in Japan

Brisk sales of the DS and DS Lite portable game systems and the latest Super Mario video game have boosted Nintendo's quarterly profits by 10.2%.

The Japanese console maker made 15.6bn yen ($134.3m; £105.8m) in the three months to June 2006.

Nintendo plans to launch its new Wii console to compete with the Microsoft's XBox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3 later this year.

It has now revised its profits up by 14% to 125bn yen for 2006.

Top selling games during the quarter included Brain Training for Adults and New Super Mario Bros, the latter of which has topped US games charts for the past two months.

Key to success

Figures earlier this month showed that in the first half of 2006, Nintendo sold 2.6 million units of its handheld DS Lite and a further 1.3 million of the original DS.

Sony sold less than a million of its PlayStation portable.

Nintendo also made the best-selling game, Dr Kawashima's Brain Training: How Old Is Your Brain?

The Wii console is seen by analysts as key to Nintendo's future success.

It has a one-handed controller that looks like a TV remote control and uses motion-detection sensors that allow players to control the game by moving the controller in the air.