Wii Sales Exceed 100,000 In Japanese Hardware Charts

Market research firm Media Create has revealed data for weekly hardware sales in Japan for the week ending July 15th, following details of the software top thirty. Although the increasing success of the Wii is the most significant event of the week, the Nintendo DS remains the best selling console in Japan with sales stabilizing after the release of new hardware colors last month. As such unit sales were up by over 2,500 to a weekly total of 141,967, confirming a lifetime total in Japan of over 18 million units – as previous suggested by separate Enterbrain data. As usual, the Wii was the second best selling hardware of the week, with sales rising by over 34,500 units to 109,854. With the Wii having been supply constrained since launch, the sudden increase in weekly sales can only be attributed to greater stock availability in the wake of the release of Square Enix’s Dragon Quest Swords. As a result, the Wii now has a lifetime total in Japan of over 3 million units – also confirmed by earlier Enterbrain data. Despite only two titles in the top fifty and no new releases the PSP saw hardware sales rise by over 4,500 units to 37,578. The PlayStation 2 also saw an increase, of over 1,500 units, to a total of 15,777. After several weeks of rising sales though the PlayStation 3, with only one title in the top fifty, fell by over 500 units to 13,493. Despite claims by Enterbrain that the format has exceeded a lifetime total of 1 million units, Media Create’s figures put it still slightly below that milestone. Although the Xbox 360 also has only one title in the top fifty, albeit a new entry, sales rose by just over 500 units to 2,942. Sales for the Game Boy Advance family of consoles were down by almost 200 to 432 units, while the GameCube fell by a similar proportion to 106 units.