PSP, PS3 Improve In Japanese Weekly Sales As PSP Go Falls

In contrast to the fairly unchanging Japanese software sales this week, hardware sales saw a bit of a shakeup, as Nintendo consoles slowed while Sony consoles improved -- all except the ever-declining PSP Go. Still, despite a big sales dropoff from last week, Wii hung on to its top slot according according to tracking firm Media Create's Japanese sales data for the week that ended January 3, 2009. The Wii sold 163,855 units, only about 30,000 more than the second-place PSP, which was in turn sold about 20,000 more than PlayStation 3. That means Nintendo DSi ended up in fourth place, contrasting last week's runner-up position. Of course, when sales of all the various Nintendo DS models are combined, the platform ends up with 180,492 sales, putting it in the overall lead. PSP Go was the week's poorest performer. While Microsoft's Xbox 360, which also struggles in the Japanese market, slightly improved its sales. In addition Sony's aging PlayStation 2 did similarly, but its PSP Go dropped down below 4,000 weekly sales -- and slid into last place. Below are the full sales rankings from Media Create for the week that ended January 3, 2009.

The following list combines models of the same base hardware to give a more general ranking: