DS/PSP Gap Widens In Weekly Japanese Hardware Sales

Market research firm Media Create has revealed data for weekly hardware sales in Japan for the week ending October 14th, following details of the software top thirty. After three weeks as the best-selling console in Japan, thanks to the launch of the PSP Slim and Lite and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, the sales gap between the PSP and Nintendo DS has begun to increase, after Nintendo’s portable regained the top spot last week by a slim margin. However, the gap has largely been a result of falling PSP sales, rather than Nintendo DS gains, with the dual screen portable actually seeing sales fall by nearly 9,000 units to 78,746. The PSP drop was more precipitous, down by over 27,000 units to 59,584. Wii sales have also continued to fall, as has been the trend for over a month now, although this week saw a slip of only a few hundred units to a total of 20,575. PlayStation 3 sales rose by almost 1,500 units to 12,365. Despite Lair's less favorable critical reception in North America, the console’s gains appear to be largely due to the success of that title at number seven in the software charts – the only other PlayStation 3 game in the top fifty this week being The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion at number thirty-five. PlayStation 2 sales fell by a few hundred to 10,181 units, while sales of Xbox 360 rose by over 4,500 units to a yearly high of 6,161. This figure is almost 1,000 units higher than during the release of Halo 3 (which re-enters the software charts at number forty-eight) two weeks ago, with the sudden drop last week apparently a result of low stock. The Game Boy Advance SP and Micro sold a combined 187 units, while the GameCube sold 79 units.