Saling The World: Halo: Reach, Professor Layton Debut as Top Sellers

Gamasutra's weekly column, "Saling The World", covers the top five sellers for every available platform in the United States, Japan, and Europe, providing an important update of sales patterns worldwide. This week's charts, with data taken from September 16th, 2010, find Halo: Reach heading software sales in all regions, while Nintendo's latest Professor Layton sequel is off to a fast sales start in the United States. Data for "Saling The World" comes courtesy of the public sales information on Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and Amazon.co.jp, with sales split out for each platform and territory, and pre-orders disregarded. This results in a true sense of what games are selling worldwide on the real-time updated service, as follows: Multiplatform North America: 1. Halo: Reach (Microsoft, X360), 2. Demon's Souls Greatest Hits (Atlus, PS3), 3. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo, Wii), 4. Professor Layton and the Unwound Future (Nintendo, DS), 5. Halo: Reach - Limited Edition (Microsoft, X360). Japan: 1. Halo: Reach - Limited Edition (Microsoft, X360), 2. Front Mission Evolved (Square Enix, PS3), 3. Wii Party (Nintendo, Wii), 4. MonHun Nikki: Poka Poka Ailu Mura (Capcom, PSP), 5. Halo: Reach (Microsoft, X360). UK: 1. Halo: Reach (Microsoft, X360), 2. Sports Champions (SCEE, PS3), 3. Halo: Reach - Limited Edition (Microsoft, X360), 4. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo, Wii), 5. Just Dance (Ubisoft, Wii). Bungie's first-person shooter prequel Halo: Reach premieres as this week's top software seller across all platforms in the United States, Europe, and Japan. A budget-priced reissue of Demon's Souls also ranks high in this week's domestic sales rankings, as Professor Layton and the Unwound Future competes with chart mainstay Super Mario Galaxy 2 at fourth place. In Japan, Square Enix's third-person shooter Front Mission Evolved outsells Wii Party in its first week of release, while in the UK, Sports Champions debuts as the fastest-selling title for Sony's motion-sensing peripheral PlayStation Move. Nintendo Wii North America: 1. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo), 2. WipeOut: The Game (Activision), 3. New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Nintendo), 4. Wii Fit Plus with Balance Board (Nintendo), 5. Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo). Japan: 1. Wii Party (Nintendo), 2. Wii Fit Plus with Balance Board (Nintendo), 3. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo), 4. Metroid: Other M (Nintendo), 5. New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Nintendo). UK: 1. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo), 2. Just Dance (Ubisoft), 3. Dance on Broadway (Ubisoft), 4. Lego Harry Potter (Warner Bros), 5. Wii Fit Plus with Balance Board (Nintendo). Activision's television series-based WipeOut: The Game makes a big impression in this week's domestic Wii sales charts, despite a number of negative reviews from customers at Amazon. New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Wii Fit Plus, and Mario Kart Wii also rank among this week's top domestic sellers. Metroid: Other M sees a drop in popularity in Japan after debuting at second place last week, while Super Mario Galaxy 2 overtakes Just Dance for the top chart spot in the UK. Xbox 360 North America: 1. Halo: Reach (Microsoft), 2. Halo: Reach - Limited Edition (Microsoft), 3. Halo: Reach - Legendary Edition (Microsoft), 4. Alan Wake - Limited Edition (Microsoft), 5. BioShock 2 (2K Games). Japan: 1. Halo: Reach - Limited Edition (Microsoft), 2. Halo: Reach (Microsoft), 3. Monster Hunter Frontier Online: Beginner's Package (Capcom), 4. Strike Witches - Limited Edition (Cyber Front), 5. Front Mission Evolved - Limited Edition (Square Enix). UK: 1. Halo: Reach (Microsoft), 2. Halo: Reach - Limited Edition (Microsoft), 3. Mafia II (2K Games), 4. Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar), 5. Mass Effect 2 (EA Games). Both the $79.99 Limited Edition and $149.99 Legendary Edition of Halo: Reach finish as top platform sellers in the United States in the game's debut week. The Limited Edition of Alan Wake sees increased sales following a recent price drop, as a discounted BioShock 2 finishes up the domestic charts at fifth place. Monster Hunter Frontier Online and Strike Witches continue to see big sales in Japan, while Mafia II manages an impressive showing in the UK following the release of Halo: Reach. PlayStation 3 North America: 1. Demon's Souls: Greatest Hits (Atlus), 2. Madden NFL 11 (EA Sports), 3. Final Fantasy XIII (Square Enix), 4. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Activision), 5. Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar). Japan: 1. Front Mission Evolved (Square Enix), 2. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Square Enix), 3. Assassin's Creed II: Special Edition (Ubisoft), 4. Sengoku Basara 3 (Capcom), 5. Demon's Souls (SCEI). UK: 1. Sports Champions (SCEE), 2. Mafia II (2K Games), 3. Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar), 4. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Activision), 5. Resident Evil 5: Move Edition (Capcom). After recently joining Sony's budget-priced "Greatest Hits" series, Demon's Souls leads PlayStation 3 software sales in North America. Last week's sales leader Madden NFL 11 falls to second place, as a discounted Final Fantasy XIII trails at third. Demon's Souls also charts as a top platform seller in Japan, while Sports Champions and a reissued version of Resident Evil 5 head Move-specific software sales in Europe. PC North America: 1. Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty (Blizzard), 2. The Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria Collector's Edition (Turbine), 3. Microsoft Flight Simulator X (Microsoft), 4. The Sims 3: Fast Lane Stuff (EA Games), 5. The Sims 3: EA Games). Japan: 1. Steins;Gate (Nitro+), 2. Monster Hunter Frontier Online Season 7.0 Premium Package (Capcom), 3. Ragnarok Online RJC2010: Next Generation's Hero Vol. 2 (E Frontier), 4. Monster Hunter Frontier Online Season 8.0 Premium Package (Capcom), 5. Mount & Blade: Warband (Cyber Front). UK: 1. The Sims 3: Fast Lane Stuff (EA Games), 2. The Sims 3 (EA Games), 3. The Sims 3: Ambitions (EA Games), 4. Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty (Blizzard), 5. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (EA Games). The Mines of Moria Collector's Edition of The Lord of the Rings Online sees a sales spike in North America this week, following a sharp drop in price resulting from the game becoming free-to-play. Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty remains the biggest-selling PC title in North America, while The Sims 3 and its recently issued Fast Lane Stuff expansion pack rank as top titles in the UK. Nintendo DS North America: 1. Professor Layton and the Unwound Future (Nintendo), 2. Club Penguin: Elite Penguin Force - Collector's Edition Bundle (Disney), 3. New Super Mario Bros. (Nintendo), 4. Pokemon SoulSilver Version (Nintendo), 5. Mario Kart DS (Nintendo). Japan: 1. One Piece: Gigant Battle (Bandai Namco), 2. Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side 3rd Story (Konami), 3. Eigokoro Kyoushitsu DS (Nintendo), 4. New Super Mario Bros. (Nintendo), 5. Tomodachi Collection (Nintendo). UK: 1. Jam with the Band (Nintendo), 2. Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies (Nintendo), 3. Tetris Party Deluxe (Nintendo), 4. Toy Story 3 (Disney), 5. New Super Mario Bros. (Nintendo). The third entry in Nintendo's Professor Layton logic puzzler series, Professor Layton and the Unwound Future, leads over a price-dropped Club Penguin as this week's top-selling portable console title in the United States. Bandai Namco's manga-based brawler One Piece: Gigant Battle heads DS sales in Japan for the second week in a row, as Nintendo's discounted Jam with the Band outsells Dragon Quest IX in the UK. PlayStation Portable North America: 1. Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep (Square Enix), 2. Dissidia Final Fantasy (Square Enix), 3. Phantasy Star Portable 2 (Sega), 4. God of War: Chains of Olympus (SCEA), 5. Valkyria Chronicles II (Sega). Japan: 1. MonHun Nikki: Poka Poka Ailu Mura (Capcom), 2. Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's Tag Force 5 (Konami), 3. Hatsune Miku: Project Diva 2nd (Sega), 4. Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G (Capcom), 5. VitaminX Evolution Plus - Limited Edition (D3 Publisher). UK: 1. Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep - Limited Edition (Square Enix), 2. Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep (Square Enix), 3. Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron (LucasArts), 4. Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (Rockstar), 5. Toy Story 3 (Disney). Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep keeps its lead as North America's biggest-selling PSP title, while Sega's Phantasy Star Portable 2 takes third place in domestic platform sales in its premiere week. Birth by Sleep also remains the platform's biggest seller in the UK, while Capcom's Monster Hunter spinoff MonHun Nikki: Poka Poka Ailu Mura fends off competition from Konami's debuting Yu-Gi-Oh! sequel 5D's Tag Force 5 in Japan.