Several of our retail sources in North America have now confirmed that which we already seem to know, which is that Nintendo is launching the Wii U on November 18th for the North American market.

The retailers that we spoke with said it isn’t surprising that Nintendo has selected a Sunday launch date, as the company has in the past seemed to always gravitate toward Sunday releases. According to what we are hearing, some of the bigger stores are already planning a midnight launch for the system.

Nintendo has not officially confirmed the date to anyone yet, but with retailers already talking about a launch on the 18th, it does seem all but assured at this point. No word yet on what kind of inventory levels buyers should expect for the new system, or exactly what games will be available at launch. Expect to hear more about this at E3 in June.