Saling The World: World of Wariocraft

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 January 18th, 2007, feature WarioWare: Smooth Moves and World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade dominating sales in the U.S. and Europe, while Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops sees an unexpected surge of demand in Japan. 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: Nintendo Wii North America: 1. WarioWare: Smooth Moves (Nintendo), 2. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Nintendo), 3. Rayman Raving Rabbids (Nintendo), 4. Trauma Center: Second Opinion (Atlus), 5. Madden NFL 07 (EA Sports). Japan: 1. Wii Sports (Nintendo), 2. Hajimete no Wii (Nintendo), 3. Excite Truck (Nintendo), 4. Zelda no Densetsu: Twilight Princess (Nintendo), 5. Odoru Made in Wario (Nintendo). UK: 1. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Nintendo), 2. WarioWare: Smooth Moves (Nintendo), 3. Wii Play (Nintendo), 4. Red Steel (Ubisoft), 5. Rayman Raving Rabbids (Ubisoft). WarioWare: Smooth Moves comes out swinging in its first week of release in the United States, unseating former sales champ The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess and establishing itself as the week's best-selling console game across all platforms. The upcoming U.S. release of Wii Play is also garnering a lot of attention at Amazon, where preorders were briefly opened and subsequently closed due to unexpected demand. This is partially because of Wii Play's inclusion of the difficult to find Wii Remote Controller, which still fetches premium prices from third-party sellers both at Amazon and elsewhere. Xbox 360 North America: 1. Gears of War (Microsoft), 2. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition (Capcom), 3. Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas (Ubisoft), 4. Fight Night Round 3 (EA Sports), 5. Call of Duty 3 (Activision). Japan: 1. Atsumare! Piñata (Microsoft), 2. Gears of War (Microsoft), 3. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition (Capcom), 4. Bullet Witch (AQ Interactive), 5. Call of Duty 2 (Konami). UK: 1. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition (Capcom), 2. Gears of War (Microsoft), 3. Table Tennis (Rockstar), 4. Call of Duty 3 (Activision), 5. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2K Games). After a brief stay at the top in the week following its debut, Capcom's Lost Planet: Extreme Condition finds itself pushed back to second place in U.S. Xbox 360 software sales by Gears of War. In Japan, meanwhile, Atsumare! Piñata continues to surprise with its success at fending off the just-debuted Gears of War for the top spot, while preorders for upcoming titles like The Idol Master and Riot Act pick up steam in the weeks leading up to their release. PlayStation 3 North America: 1. Resistance: Fall of Man (SCEA), 2. Marvel: Ultimate Alliance (Activision), 3. Madden NFL 07 (EA Sports), 4. NBA 2K7 (2K Sports), 5. Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII (Ubisoft). Japan: 1. Resistance: Jinrui Botsuraku no Hi (SCEI), 2. Ridge Racer 7 (Namco), 3. MotorStorm (SCEI), 4. Armored Core 4 (From Software), 5. Formula One Championship Edition (SCEI). This week sees a sales boost for 2K Sports' NBA 2K7 in the United States, while anticipation and preorder numbers continue to grow for the upcoming PS3 port of Sonic the Hedgehog. Armored Core 4 drops a few places after leading sales in Japan last week, however, as preorders for the enhanced Xbox 360 port remain on the rise. PlayStation 2 North America: 1. Guitar Hero II (RedOctane), 2. Madden NFL 07 (EA Sports), 3. Guitar Hero (RedOctane), 4. Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol (Konami), 5. Final Fantasy XII (Square Enix). Japan: 1. Shining Force EXA (Sega), 2. .hack//G.U. Vol. 3: Aruku Youna Hayasa de (Bandai), 3. Dragon Shadow Spell (Flight-Plan), 4. Okami (Capcom), 5. Seiken Densetsu 4 (Square Enix). UK: 1. Canis Canem Edit (Rockstar), 2. Buzz! The Big Quiz (SCEE), 3. SingStar Party (SCEE), 4. FIFA 07 (EA Sports), 5. SingStar (SCEE). Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol makes a return to the United States's top five PS2 sellers after a small drop in sales last week, though the title still has a ways to go in catching up to the success of fellow rhythm genre hit Guitar Hero. Japan, on the other hand, has its PS2 charts dominated by the likes of Shining Force EXA, .hack//G.U. Vol. 3, and Dragon Shadow Spell -- a trio of games that were only released a few days ago, but could lead sales for weeks to come. PC North America: 1. World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade (Blizzard), 2. World of Warcraft (Blizzard), 3. Medieval II: Total War (Sega), 4. The Sims 2 (EA Games), 5. Microsoft Flight Simulator X (Microsoft). Japan: 1. Sukatto Golf Pangya (Frontier Groove), 2. Heart no Kuni no Alice ~Wonderful Wonder World~ (QuinRose), 3. Sukatto Golf Pangya - Hajimete Kit (Frontier Groove), 4. Football Manager 2007 (Sega), 5. Final Fantasy XI All-In-One Pack 2006 (Square Enix). UK: 1. World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade (Blizzard), 2. World of Warcraft (Blizzard), 3. Guild Wars: Nightfall (NC Soft), 4. Battlefield 2142 (EA Games), 5. Age of Empires III (Microsoft). The highly anticipated World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade has little trouble in becoming the week's single best-selling software title across all platforms in the United States and Europe in its first week of release. The title also sees strong preorder interest in Japan, where it's expected to debut later this month. Given the popularity of the World of Warcraft franchise, The Burning Crusade is expected to top the PC charts in all regions for quite some time. Nintendo DS North America: 1. Brain Age (Nintendo), 2. Mario Kart DS (Nintendo), 3. New Super Mario Bros. (Nintendo), 4. Big Brain Academy (Nintendo), 5. Kirby Squeak Squad (Nintendo). Japan: 1. Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker (Square Enix), 2. Sekaiju no Meikyuu (Atlus), 3. Kaitou Wario the Seven (Nintendo), 4. Hiite Utaeru DS Guitar M-06 (Plato), 5. Zaidan Houjin Nippon Kanji Nouryoku Kentei Kyoukai Koushiki Soft: 200 Mannin no KanKen: Tokoton Kanji Nou (IE Institute). UK: 1. Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training (Nintendo), 2. New Super Mario Bros. (Nintendo), 3. Animal Crossing: Wild World (Nintendo), 4. Big Brain Academy (Nintendo), 5. Nintendogs: Dalmatian & Friends (Nintendo). Japan gives its brain-training mania a rest this week in favor of newer titles like Kaitou Wario the Seven and Atlus's Sekaiju no Meikyuu. In other surprises, Mario Kart DS sees a sudden surge this week in the United States, while the recently released Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Justice for All also performs well, but not well enough to break into the top five. PlayStation Portable North America: 1. Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (Rockstar), 2. Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (Konami), 3. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories (Rockstar), 4. Star Wars Battlefront II (LucasArts), 5. Need for Speed: Most Wanted (EA Games). Japan: 1. Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (Konami), 2. Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology (Namco), 3. Talkman Shiki: Shabe Lingual Eikaiwa (SCEI), 4. Maplus: Portable Navi (Edia), 5. Makai Senki Disgaea Portable (Nippon Ichi). UK: 1. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories (Rockstar), 2. Mind Quiz (Ubisoft), 3. Pro Evolution Soccer 6 (Konami), 4. Medal of Honor: Heroes (EA Games), 5. FIFA 07 (EA Sports). Despite shipment delays and unexpected demand, Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops remains a very strong seller this week in Japan. Reports say that many Japanese retailers are experiencing trouble in keeping Portable Ops in stock, as the title's popularity continues to grow even after selling more than 300,000 units since its release. Portable Ops also continues to pull impressive sales numbers in the United States, and should see similar success in Europe upon its release in April.