Japanese software sales: week ending 02.11.07

by Jonti Davies { Feb 15th 2007 at 8:30AM }

Let's welcome in Media Create's record of the past week's game sales in Japan. This is where you'll get big numbers and not-so-big numbers, mixed in with the crucial numbers one through ten -- a mathematician's wet dream. Firstly, here's this week's chart, with combined total sales of titles inside those pouting parentheses:

Virtua Fighter 5 - 48,346 units sold last week (new entry / Sega, PS3)
Wii Sports - 45,897 (1,004,555 units sold to date / Nintendo, Wii)
Wii Play - 36,090 (879,432 / Nintendo, Wii)
More Brain Training - 32,800 (3,963,712 / Nintendo, DS)
New Super Mario Bros. - 29,026 (4,118,078 / Nintendo DS)
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - 27,519 (304,113 / Capcom, PS2)
Wario: Master of Disguise - 26,815 (185,695 / Nintendo, DS)
Harvest Moon: The Island I Grew Up On - 26,804 (106,212 / Marvelous, DS)
Luminous Arc - 25,676 (new entry / Marvelous, DS)
J-League Pro Soccer 5 - 24,468 (131,541 / Sega, PS2)

And here are some lessons we can learn from the big figures:

Virtua Fighter 5 is the WINNER
Sega is Sony's most valuable ally in Japan right now
Capcom's San Andreas marketing has paid off
DS-like "slow sellers" are also possible on Wii
There's still a place in the Japanese market for little players, which is just Marvelous

Tags: Brain Age, BrainAge, Harvest Moon, HarvestMoon, J-League, Luminous Arc, LuminousArc, New Super Mario Bros., NewSuperMarioBros., Virtua Fighter 5, VirtuaFighter5, Wario, Wii Play, Wii Sports, WiiPlay, WiiSports

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

sheppy @ Feb 15th 2007 8:39AM

Well, VF5 had actually increased sales... it's no DOA4 in sales yet. But I do expect, as more consoles are bought on March 1st, VF5 to get some residual sales.

Grog @ Feb 15th 2007 8:41AM

I'm not sure how much of a winner you can call VF5 when it barely outsells Wii Sports in its opening week. But then, I'm given to understand that VF5 is more popular in the arcades in Japan.

Myke @ Feb 15th 2007 8:43AM

Wow, nice to see New Super Mario Bros still chugging along nicely. Then again, I suppose when another 60 Billion people get a DS every month there's a huge market for it.

Szu @ Feb 15th 2007 8:54AM

Wow, it looks like Nintendo has another 1 million seller in Wii Play.

Plus, More Brain Training is about a week or two away from breaking 4 million.

SynikaL @ Feb 15th 2007 8:57AM

"Firstly, here's this week's chart, with combined total sales of titles inside those pouting ellipses"

Not trying to be a prick, but, am I missing something here? An ellipse is an oval shape...

-Kimosabae

Grog @ Feb 15th 2007 9:00AM

"Not trying to be a prick, but, am I missing something here? An ellipse is an oval shape..."

You are missing something. ;)

An eclipse is an oval shape. An ellipse is a "..." - then again, I don't see those either.

Jonti @ Feb 15th 2007 9:07AM

Nos. 5 & 6, thanks for pointing that out! Post edited to reflect what I was meaning to say.

Jonti

Aeris130 @ Feb 15th 2007 9:09AM

11. (NDS, Nintendo) Animal Crossing Wild World
12. (NDS, Nintendo) Picross DS
13. (NDS, Nintendo) Common Knowledge Training
14. (NDS, Nintendo) Mario Kart DS
15. (NDS, Nintendo) Brain Age
16. (NDS, Pokemon) Pokémon Diamond
17. (NDS, Nintendo) English Training
18. (NDS, IE Institute) Kanji Brain Test 2M
19. (NDS, Pokemon) Pokémon Pearl
20. (NDS, Sega) Sangokushi Taisen DS
21. (NDS, Sega) Love+Berry
22. (PSP, Capcom) Monster Hunter Portable
23. (NDS, Square-Enix) Dragon Quest Monsters Joker
24. (NDS, Nintendo) Hotel Dusk: Room 215
25. (NDS, Rocket Co.) Kanji Test
26. (NDS, Bandai-Namco) Heisei Board of Education DS
27. (WII, Nintendo) Wario Ware Smooth Moves
28. (NDS, Nintendo) 1000 Recipes
29. (NDS, Nintendo) Kirby Squeek Squad
30. (NDS, Sega) Puyo-Puyo!

PS2 - 2
PSP - 1
PS3 - 1
NDS - 23
WII - 3

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=142554

sheppy @ Feb 15th 2007 9:22AM

And here's where we have fun with Aeris.

Percentage of Nintendo Published DS games...
61%

Percentage of Nintendo Published Wii games...
100%

Now comes the question... how does a Nintendo platform look to third parties?

LR @ Feb 15th 2007 9:28AM

How is it possible the DS sells 146,000 units in a week, but the highest charting DS "game" sells 32,000 units in a week?

What are the rest of those DS users doing?

Evan @ Feb 15th 2007 9:34AM

@LR
The total number of DS games exceeds 146,000. Some people buy Brain Age, some people buy Pokemon - that's why having a solid back-catalogue of games is more important than having one or two mega-hits.

Myke @ Feb 15th 2007 9:36AM

Sheppy, I think that the fact that first-party DS and Wii titles are getting Wii's into homes is the only thing that 3rd parties need to worry about. That's the bottom line. The consumers have the systems in hand, the user base is set, and now it's up to the 3rd parties themselves to make a game that appeals to them. There's way too much of the "Nintendo is 3rd parties biggest competition" BS, seriously. I understand that the Gamecube had a TON of first party releases and that those were the only reason that ALOT of people bought the system, however, it's still not Nintendo's fault that the vast majority of games release for the Cube were shoddy 3rd party ports and disposable crap. I'll say this now and then put my flame suit on: Had RE4 been released within the first year of the Cube's debut...that console war would've looked alot different. I'm not saying, by any stretch, that the Cube would have won, or even necessarily come in second, but had that game been a close-to-launch title, the Cube would not be looked down upon in the way it is today.

*Flame suit zipped up*

32_Footsteps @ Feb 15th 2007 9:36AM

Okay, just to correct some definitions...

An ellipse is an oval. An ellipsis is a series of three periods to indicate a pause, as if a thought is interrupted. The catch is that the plural of both is spelled ellipses, although the last syllable is pronounced differently on each (the oval ends with a schwa, while the periods end with a long E sound).

And an eclipse is when one body (usually astronomical) moves in front of another such that the second is obscured by the first. One example is when the sun moves in front of the Earth.

Okay, that said, onto discussing games.

I wonder if they will port Luminous Arc. Most of the list seems like guaranteed for porting (in the cases where it hasn't already been ported, like New SMB). However, I bet that's the big question mark. Of course, I now expect that the port was announced months ago and I just missed it.

Now, as for the common beef that third parties are scared of Nintendo's first-party sales dominance, I have to point out that it's not necessarily a matter of selling the most, though a company will obviously hope for that. It's a question of where you'll make the most profit.

It won't matter if you won't be the best-selling Wii game, so long as you can sell twice as many copies on the Wii than on other systems - or if the profit margin is sufficiently large on the Wii that even if you sell just as many, the Wii version brings more profits.

Total unit sales are the flashy thing we pay attention to - but companies are more intetested in the net profit margin. If development on the Wii can bring that, people will develop for it.

Grog @ Feb 15th 2007 9:39AM

"Percentage of Nintendo Published DS games...
61%

Percentage of Nintendo Published Wii games...
100%

Now comes the question... how does a Nintendo platform look to third parties?"

Considering that the DS has outsold the PSP 3:1 in Japan (according to vgcharts.org), I think I'd rather try for the 39% of 15 million (5.85 million) rather than whatever chunk of the PSP's 5.10 million I could grab.

As for the Wii... yeah, all 3 of the games (includes Wii Play, which is really more of a peripheral) are Nintendo published. But then, as we've already established, people tend to buy Nintendo products not just for the hardware, but the great software as well. I know I didn't buy my Macbook just 'cause it looks pretty. ;)

Really, sheppy, I've never before heard an argument that dominating the software charts is a *bad* thing.

Grog @ Feb 15th 2007 9:41AM

And holy cow, Footsteps, thanks for the corrections. My brain is definitely a bit fried here this morning.

Aeris130 @ Feb 15th 2007 10:02AM

Grog beat me to it. 23 titles of the top 30 - check. Million-sellers - check. Product portfolio not consisting of PS360 ports - check.

What should Nintendo do? Sell less games? Publish less games? Lower the quality of said games? Or just go third party on the PS3?

I mean, they can't do anything else then continue to relase new games. If anyone want's to top them, then they'll have to release games (see how I keep getting back to games) that ppl prefer better. Until then, Nintendo shouldn't be blamed. The consumers should.

Or the games. Which is the reasen I buy Nintendos games, so I can play them on my video game system. Nintendos games that is.

salman @ Feb 15th 2007 10:09AM

Nice to see the PS# at the top of a list. Check out http://www.savetheps3.com for more PS3 news

Hwrd @ Feb 15th 2007 10:29AM

>>Now comes the question... how does a Nintendo platform look to third parties?

Hwrd @ Feb 15th 2007 10:31AM

>>Now comes the question... how does a Nintendo platform look to third parties?

Hwrd @ Feb 15th 2007 10:32AM

I suspect very Nintendo looks very good when you look at the total picture:

3rd party Nintendo titles: 9
3rd party everything else combined: 4

Whether or not Nintendo has the rest of the sales or not doesn't matter; Nintendo platforms represented more than twice the sales potential for 3rd parties than what Sony/MS did this past week in Japan.

Kevout @ Feb 15th 2007 10:34AM

Since when is Pokemon a game publisher

Biofreak @ Feb 15th 2007 10:38AM

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - 27,519 (304,113 / Capcom, PS2) CAPCOM !!!? LOL
i always thought its made by Rockstar games north!

Its a scam chart.

Vidikron @ Feb 15th 2007 10:40AM

Well, the DS is cleaning house as usual. But I'm kind of surprised to see Wii Play that high... but then again I'm not. That game is getting trashed in reviews.

32_Footsteps @ Feb 15th 2007 10:45AM

Biofreak, it's legit. This is the Japanese chart, and it lists the Japanese publisher. In Japan, Capcom holds the publishing rights to GTA, so they get listed as the publisher on Asian charts.

This post has been brought to you by research. Research - it's what makes you find out if things are true or not.

Biofreak @ Feb 15th 2007 10:47AM

LOL why whould RS sell their rights to campcom?
dumbasses.. they could make more money.

Vidikron @ Feb 15th 2007 10:52AM

@26

No, they wouldn't make more money if they promoted the game themselves. IMO, the Japanese market has a strong bias against non-Japanese developers, thus you need to put a Japanese company name on game for it to sell well.

sheppy @ Feb 15th 2007 10:52AM

This is why I love Joystiq. Seriously.

When I said the whole third parties thing, where exactly did I specify PS3 and Sony? We all know 360 is the proven third party arena in the new gen. We are all so proud of saying that anytime it becomes a PS3 vs. 360 debate but this fact doesn't present itself when this same arguement is thrown against Nintendo.

But fine, let's throw it in a very narrow view, that way some of you knuckle dragging mouth breathers can keep up. The narrow view features a small amount of the picture but utilizes small words and a severe lack of observing market trends. Both of which serve many here well.

Of the many million sellers on Nintendo DS, only two are from third parties. Picture that, if you will. Of those, both are from established series. Now, Nintendo has the ability to get new IPs to take the big risk and hopefully snag sales, but what of third parties? Seeing something familiar about their presence? Even a game like Love & Berry, considering what it is, is a recipe for success. The only mystery to me, at this point, is Luminous Arc. That's a suprise guest. So, in essence, what you have is this. Nintendo, leading the charge with popular software and third parties following suit with established IPs and "me too" products closely resembling Nintendo published products. And who can blame them? When a pattern is established, your best chance is to develop for as cheaply and quickly as possible following current market trends. Nintendo DS fits that bill perfectly.

Likewise, when you look at Wii software and how it sells, third parties are left behind in the charts and new third party products development focus seems to be waiting to see what the next big hit will be. In fact, most developers are still cautious about Wii and many which aren't are spending most of their time running through their catalog of games from the last two years to see what they can bring over.

So when you ask, "Since when is it a bad thing to dominate sales charts?" I point merely to the following evidence.

http://www.vgcharts.com/page4.html

Amazing, huh? Nintendo usually doiminated sales charts the last two generations. And yet, here we (well, mostly you guys. I personally don't see how any console that sells 20 million+ is a failure) are, calling N64 and Gamecube failures.

WizarDru @ Feb 15th 2007 10:56AM

"That game is getting trashed in reviews."

What's to be surprised about? It's a $10 game packed with a $40 remote. As a $50 game, it's a joke. As a $10 game, it's pretty good. Most of the reviews seem to ignore that aspect of it. It's barely above a tech demo, and Ninty knew that. It's why they bundled it in the first place.

If I were Sony, I'd be a tad concerned. Only one PS3 game on the top 30, and it's sales are OK, not great. One-eyed men in the kingdom of the blind and all that, but NSMB is still selling? Wow. How many games sell 1 million, let alone 4 million?

As for the lack of third-party titles, I don't find that odd in the least. The retailers were all holding back to wait and see how the Wii did. So with only a few exceptions, most held back and are only in development now.

Competing with Ninty, though, is a very real concern. Ninty is their own best developer and that can be hard to fight. But the DS has sold so astonishingly well (and continues to do so) that developing for it is a no-brainer. That fact alone damages the PSP's potential game market. That and the fact that Sony apparently has virtually forgotten about the PSP.

Biofreak @ Feb 15th 2007 10:57AM

Vidikron
It proves that Japanese dont like American products.
Bah this is said. 360 should have Nintendo Sticker on it there then, so it can sell millions there and for every sold console Nin gets $10 for the sticker they put :D

Jeff @ Feb 15th 2007 11:04AM

"IMO, the Japanese market has a strong bias against non-Japanese developers, thus you need to put a Japanese company name on game for it to sell well."

It's got absolutely nothing to do with that whatsoever.

Rockstar puts their names on the GTA games in Japan just like everywhere else. GTA is not marketed as a "Capcom" game (though both names appear on the game, it's still "A Rockstar North game" just as it is here.) They also used to have a Japanese office. The problem is it's expensive to maintain a publishing arm in a country where you only release 1 game per year. And it's almost impossible to build any sort of logistical operation from scratch with so little product to offer.

Capcom can get RS's games in every store across Japan, can do all sorts of marketing and can do it for a lot less money than RS themselves ever could.

I'm telling you this from first-hand experience. I was actually part of the RS marketing team that helped Capcom out with their promotion of GTAIII and Vice City.

This site was part of that effort, though it's apparently not been updated since I was there: http://www.rockstargames.jp/

Also this: http://www.vicecity.jp/
And this: http://www.gta3.jp/

All three of those sites were developed in New York.

Jeff @ Feb 15th 2007 11:05AM

Just to clarify, the *Japanese* versions of those sites were developed in New York as well.

Squints @ Feb 15th 2007 11:10AM

I bet Kakuto Chojin: Back Alley Brutal was at the bottom.

Blue_Falcon @ Feb 15th 2007 11:22AM

I found it slightly interesting that VF5 beat Wii Sports by a meager 3K (considering that it's already sold over 1Million to date) That, and how Brain Training and NSMB are STILL selling major amounts.

Japanese sales are such an interesting read, these guys always give me something to look forward to each week. Always a shock or two to be found.

Flynn @ Feb 15th 2007 11:27AM

New Super Mario Bros. is still in there.
That's cool. :)

MocaLantern @ Feb 15th 2007 11:27AM

(US Releases)
Virtua Fighter 5 2-20
F1 Racing 2-27
MotorStorm 3-5

Pretty impressive titles back to back for 2 weeks.

Some salt and pepper for those that will be eating all of their biased words!

SynikaL @ Feb 15th 2007 11:30AM

Grog:

"An eclipse is an oval shape. An ellipse is a "..." - then again, I don't see those either."

Errrm, not quite.

An ECLIPSE is the astronimical phenomenon involving the blocking of the Sun's rays via relationship between the Moon and Earth.

ELLIPSIS, are what you pointed out.

An ELLIPSE is an oval shape.

I figured he meant to say parentheses, but ended up thinking he was tyring to be poetic or something, and I just wasn't getting it.

:/

-Kimosabae

Dave The One Mendez @ Feb 15th 2007 11:31AM

And where is Gears of War? Blue Dragon?

SynikaL @ Feb 15th 2007 11:34AM

I HATE Joystiq's e-mail based comment system. I actually typed the response to Grong about 2 HOURS ago.

What's the point of having the password if I have to wait for the stupid email everytime?

-Kimosabae

JRM @ Feb 15th 2007 11:41AM

"I found it slightly interesting that VF5 beat Wii Sports by a meager 3K (considering that it's already sold over 1Million to date) That, and how Brain Training and NSMB are STILL selling major amounts.

Japanese sales are such an interesting read, these guys always give me something to look forward to each week. Always a shock or two to be found."

It's sure more interesting than the movie tie-ins, Maddens, and FPSs that consistently top sales here.

Szu @ Feb 15th 2007 11:43AM

@37

Gears of War and Blue Dragon sold well for the 360, but alas they've dropped of the the top 50 chart weeks ago.

I predict VF5 dropping out of the top five next week. I think the Professor Layton game for the DS will be a big seller next week.

Vidikron @ Feb 15th 2007 11:44AM

@38

There should be a password in those e-mails you are getting. If you use that your reponses will be posted immediately... like this one :-)

Vidikron @ Feb 15th 2007 11:46AM

@39
"It's sure more interesting than the movie tie-ins, Maddens, and FPSs that consistently top sales here"

Yeah, a list of Pokemon and Brain Age clones with a sprinkling of cooking games is 10x much more interesting.... maybe 100x.

SynikaL @ Feb 15th 2007 11:55AM

Vidikron:

Thanx, didn't know about that. Much better.

-Kimosabae

Jouw @ Feb 15th 2007 11:59AM

An eclipse has to do with the moon.
There's an ellipse, which is an oval.
And an ellipsis, which is 3 dots: "..."
But 6 is right. There are zero ellipses in the sales chart, and none of them are pouting.

F1ghter @ Feb 15th 2007 12:18PM

LOL MISINFORMATION!

This is the most hilarious post on Joystiq in quite some time, and it isn't because of the post itself.

Judd @ Feb 15th 2007 12:21PM

So now we get the weekly Japanese software and hardware charts. Don't get me wrong, the more the better. I juest don't see why we can't get a list of the top selling software/hardware in North America, or at least Europe. How many people in J

Judd @ Feb 15th 2007 12:23PM

Sorry my comment got cut off:

How many people in Japan read Joystiq? Wouldn't the audience be a lot more interested in the sales that affect them. I mean a couple of days ago, this site posted a link to the top 200 games of 2006, but it would've been nice to know beforehand. After Madden, Cars is the best selling game? Cars!

Myke @ Feb 15th 2007 12:32PM

Sheppy -

"Nintendo, leading the charge with popular software and third parties following suit with established IPs and "me too" products closely resembling Nintendo published products. And who can blame them? When a pattern is established, your best chance is to develop for as cheaply and quickly as possible following current market trends. "

Ok, Let me ask you something. I'm not being a prick and I'm not being sarcastic, I actually want your honest answer to the following question: What would you do to remedy the situation if you were Nintendo?

Honestly, should they start making poor quality games so that the third party trash can seem comparable and/or better? Should Nintendo stick to just making systems? Honestly, if Nintendo making really really great games and then the 3rd parties doing the "me too" thing, I really don't think you can blame nintendo either. It's the 3rd parties own fault for not being original/creative/inventive/innovative. Thats the bottom line, if great games are made people will by them (most of the time: see - Ico/Okami/many others for the exceptions). I honestly would love to know your opinion on what needs to be done.