Sales Chart JPN: Mario is in. What else do you expect?

Week 23 July - 29 July 2007

What do you expect? It's Mario we are talking about. The world can never have too much of that plumber. The Americans love him, and so does the Japanese. Last week, Mario Party 8 sold an amazing 264,953 units.

Normally, selling 152,379 could make you the week's number 1, but no, Sony has to release Everybody's Golf 5 on the same week as Mario. So yet again, the number 1 eluded the PS3. Don't know when the next PS3 game will make it to the top 3.

Out of the top 10, the top 7 are all new games. Every platform has been represented in the top 7. Wii took charge with Mario, while PS3 got their hot golf chick to do their dirty work. Drumming Taiko (93,909) on DS seems sounds fun, the PSP has GTA (44,939) to thank for and even Xbox 360 has The Elder Scroll IV (40,168) in number 7.

What a week for the new comers. Of course, that means everything else is pushed out of the way. But look, Wii Sports and Zelda still refused to get out of the top 10. It's still staying around in 10th.

Wait, did I see a new GameCube game making the chart? Gotcha Force made it to 50th for a GameCube. Very strange happening this week. Must be the new comers syndrome.

Best selling games for each platform (that is on the chart) this week

Wii - Mario Party 8
PS3 - Everybody's Golf 5
DS - Taiko Drums
PSP - GTA: Liberty City Stories
XBox - The Elder Scroll IV
PS2 - Jikkyou Powerful Pro Baseball 14
NGC - Gotcha Force

Number of titles in the top 50 for each platform this week:

DS - 30
Wii - 7
PS2 - 6
PSP - 3
PS3 - 2
360 - 1
NGC - 1

Console War VII: Battle for Nippon

So, with so many new games on the top 10, what's happening with the hardware this week? Well, DS and Wii still lead, but demand for the Wii has dropped for the two weeks running. Is Japan finally realised the Wii is not all they want afterall? Or is it just because of the golf chick? Who knows. But golf chick is certainly working with PS3.

Wii's dominance has dropped from 85% down to only just above 70% this week.

Bundled with the PS3, the number of the black brick more than doubled from last week. Xbox 360 is also up, all thanks to The Elder Scroll. But it will probably go back down soon.

DSL - 154,459
Wii - 86,786
PSP - 32,894
PS2 - 14,059
PS3 - 12,187
Xbox360 - 2,664

Market share this week

DSL vs PSP
81.10% vs 18.90%

Wii vs PS3 vs XBox 360
70.24% vs 26.24% vs 3.52%

Source: Media Create and their new shiny website