PlayStation consoles passed a couple of sales milestones in Japan last month. During the second week of September the PS3 overtook the Wii in unit sales for 2010 in their shared home territory. That was not enough for PlayStation though as that same week, according to figures from Enterbrain, the PSP’s lifetime sales passed the 15m mark, reaching 15,009,120. Not at all bad considering the latest provisional estimates for Japan’s total population put it at 127,360,000.
While 15m is a large number, you will not be surprised to know that a few more Nintendo DS’ have been sold in Japan. As of that same week the DS had sold a total of 31,039,215 units just in Japan (worldwide figures at the end of June were over 132m). So the lifetime sales of the DS in Japan are twice those of the PSP, a sales ratio that was replicated this September thanks to the latest release in the franchise of games about pocketable monsters…
Week Ending September 5th
The PSP-3000 started the month falling back from the end of August release of the Monster Hunter spin-off Monster Hunter Diary: Poka Poka Airu Village though its 36K sales were still around double the sales of the DSi or DSi LL. The Monster Hunter title itself held on to the number one spot recording a further 88k sales. Other notable software releases this week were Metroid Other M which reached number three in the charts with sales of over 45k and the budget re-release of CoD:MW2 which did okay for a Western FPS in Japan and reaching ninth with sales of just under 10k.
Week Ending September 12th
How do you dislodge monster hunters from the top of a Japanese software chart? You set a bunch of manga characters on them of course. Topping the software chart was the week’s only big new release One Piece: Gigant Battle which sold 132k copies. It is based on the popular One Piece manga which saw its latest (59th!) volume released in August set the record for the highest initial print run of any manga with its 3.2m copies.
Week Ending September 19th
The 18th of September saw the release of the latest pair of Pokemon titles Black and White. They launched with little fanfare are were barely noticed by the gaming community. Of course by little fanfare I mean no more than the ear-shattering crescendo that accompanies every Pokemon launch and by barely noticed I mean they bought a mere 2,557,779 copies in two days!
The launch had a minor impact on DS hardware sales as you can see in the graph below, with DSi sales trebling compared to the previous week with the DSi LL and DS Lite seeming more modest rises. As sales of the LL normally lead those of the standard DSi it would be interesting to know whether it is the lower cost or smaller size of the standard model that led to it seeing the largest jump in sale. I am tempted to speculate that it is the greater portability that is the key factor as Pokemon players wander the country battling each other, but I have nothing to back that up with.
While Microsoft’s 360 has settled back down to levels that pre-date the release of the 360 S it experienced a doubling in sales this week due to the release of Halo: Reach which reached fourth in the software chart with 44k sales. Between that and Pokemon were Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s Tag Force 5 at three with almost 46k sales and the PS3 version of Front Mission Evolved with sales of 51k in second place.
Week Ending September 26th
In its first full week on release Pokemon Black/White added another 829k sales to its tally putting it close to the 3.4m point, securing top spot on the software chart for a second week and pushing DS sales higher still. The PSP-3000’s jump in sales to second spot in the hardware chart was due to the release of Sega’s latest Yakusa game Kurohyou: Ryu ga Gotoku Shinshou (possibly to be called Black Leopard: Yakuza New Chapter if we see it in the West). Its sales of 174k that saw it take a corresponding second spot in the software chart would have seen it comfortably in number one spot most weeks.
The Monthly Console and Corporate Fights
Across the month the PS3 beat the Wii (83,924 vs. 62,852), the DSs beat the PSPs by almost 2-to-1 (254,654 vs. 136,541) and the PS2 continued to beat the PSPgo (5,637 vs. 3,499). Overall shares of the month’s hardware unit sales see Nintendo retake the number one spot that Sony borrowed last month.
Out of the 557,786 consoles sold, Nintendo accounted for 57% (317,506) Sony 40.5% (226,102) and Microsoft 2.5% (14,178).
Finally, here are the hardware unit sales presented in a dense grid of numerals:
| 5th | 12th | 19th | 26th | Total | |
| 360 | 2,860 | 2,915 | 5,804 | 2,599 | 14,178 |
| PS2 | 1,370 | 1,363 | 1,390 | 1,514 | 5,637 |
| PS3 | 22,227 | 19,907 | 21,096 | 20,694 | 83,924 |
| Wii | 16,080 | 15,031 | 14,833 | 16,908 | 62,852 |
| DS Lite | 4,039 | 4,327 | 7,137 | 7,011 | 22,515 |
| DSi | 16,968 | 16,345 | 47,397 | 49,411 | 130,103 |
| DSi LL | 18,929 | 19,076 | 31,254 | 32,777 | 102,036 |
| PSP | 34,839 | 30,761 | 29,866 | 37,576 | 133,042 |
| PSPgo | 927 | 809 | 863 | 900 | 3,499 |
| Total | 118,239 | 110,535 | 159,622 | 169,390 | 557,786 |
Source: Media Create
spooner_22
I know there were more DS’s sold but it’s still good to see PSP still selling quite a bit. I love PSP.
The Serb
definitely,i find myself using my psp more than i use my DS, but i guess it comes to preference as i use my psp mostly for a portable media center than anything else.
solidsteven
the ps2 still doing good and once gt5 comes out i think the wii won’t be able to overtake the ps3 again. psp go they should support more it’s getting beaten by the ps2
Danza Di Fuoco E Ghiaccio
GT5 is a kind of…. but when Capcom finally realise that Monster Hunter 4 will sell on Playstation 3 then it may sell further than the Wii which right now it needs support from many 3rd party producers (better than wasting money on failed ips eh? Capcom)
Jordaaaan
Thats if it does, and I really really hope we can get another MH on a home console.
BalramRules
PS3 FTW!
MOST SALES!!
YEPEEEE
Serebii.Net
I want Pokémon. Now.
dude90
I think the PSP is pretty much dead, sales are failing to pick up for the Go. Even if the PSP2 launches, people would eventually give up and stick to PS3.
solidsteven
i doubt it. if the psp2 if like the go then yes if not people might buy it
Quinlank
I wouldn’t say the PSP is “dead” quite yet, but it’s definitely on the downward slope. There’s still a bit of life left in it with an unusually strong software line up over the next few months(Especially if, like me, you import from the states, where there’s a real JRPG renaissance going on right now). Sales will likely stay at levels most generously described as “modest” of course, but there’s no denying it’s still putting on a good show on the games front for the time being.
I don’t doubt that once the 3DS hits it’s bye bye PSP though, Sony are pretty much boned on that score no matter what they try I think.
Charmed_Fanatic
Looking good Sony :)
MXZ
I am happy to see Sony is doing well, sales wise.
though i think once GT5 and LBP2 are release PS3 will pretty much be smashing the other systems.
2011 will be Sonys finest.
The Serb
HEAR HEAR
Quinlank
Pokemon and Monster Hunter are two of those series I just never got the appeal of. Pokemon on the original Gameboy was great at the time, yeah, but every iteration since seems to barely advance since the previous installment. I tried a recent one(Pearl?) and it was really dated feeling to play. Just don’t get it.
tonycawley
We do need to bear in mind that this is japan only, and has no reflection whatsoever on other markets as they’re all about their own countries products. I’d prefer to see u.s. Hardware sales, xbox would be massively ahead there. So the only place to take a reasonable comparison would be eu, because none of the consoles are owned by companies from there
Watchful
You’d prefer to see US hardware sales like these we report every month?
http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2010/09/10/august-npd-summer-sales-slump/
Europe is generally pro-Sony, while the UK looks more like the US. European numbers aren’t widely available but I cover lifetime UK sales to Jan 2010 in this post:
http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2010/09/03/japans-august-hardware-sales/
In those the 360 with 5m sales is 2m ahead of the PS3 (3m) and was accelerating away from it. I have not seen reliable figures for EU/UK sales for this year yet. Read our posts, the information’s all in there.
Quinlank
“Massively ahead”? At one time maybe, but the overall sales difference is around the 5m mark now isn’t it? When at one time it was around 10m as I recall. Guess that year’s head start is paying off to a degree at least.
Also, implying the 360 is doing badly in Japan because Japanese people will only buy Japanese made products holds no water when you look at how well a lot of American made non-video game related products do over there. The 360 is doing badly in Japan probably has something to do with the contempt that Microsoft showed for the Japanese market with the original Xbox carrying over.
The 360 simply doesn’t “dominate” the PS3 like it once did anymore, whether people like that or not. Once the hype wave from the “slim” console’s release dies down, it’ll be interesting to see what happens, especially with the software line up for early 2011 being so heavily in the PS3’s favour.
hazelam
can we call the go a failure now?
a download only device is fine when games cost a couple of quid, but many people don’t want to pay thirty quid for a download game, especially when they’re often more expensive than umd copies.