Wii Beaten by PS3 in Japan

Price drop fails to give Nintendo hardware lead.

Both the PSP and Wii made headlines in Japan earlier this week as ASCII Mediaworks disclosed surges for both platforms following October 1 price drops. Despite the cuts, however, neither system topped their respective categories.

On the console side, PS3 still managed to edge out Wii even after the Wii's 5,000 yen drop. The PS3 saw Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2's release, although the system's continued success is presumably due to momentum from the early September slimline release.

The fortunes were turned in the portable battle. Despite a 3,000 yen price drop, PSP still failed to beat DSi. PSP-3000 now costs less than the Nintendo hardware.

Here's Media Create's full hardware chart for September 28 through October 4. Last week's totals are in parentheses.

• DSi: 53,293 (63,342)
• PSP: 51,215 (17,334)
• PS3: 37,538 (39,960)
• Wii: 35,392 (11,731)
• DS Lite: 10,661 (15,057)
• X360: 4,244 (4,854)
• PS2: 2,179 (2,347)

On the software front, Nintendo platforms dominated as usual. Wii Fit Plus is off to a faster start than its predecessor, which sold 261,000 units in its first week back in December 2007. Inazuma Eleven 2 also showed how far Level-5 has managed to push the franchise over the past year. The first game was released in August of last year and sold just 41,000 units in its first week.

Here's the full software chart:

• Wii Fit Plus (Nintendo, Wii): 340,000
• Inazuma Eleven 2 (Level-5, NDS): 281,000
• Pokemon Heart Gold & Soul Silver (Pokemon, NDS): 267,000 (2,285,000)
• Gran Turismo (SCE, PSP): 134,000
• Macross Ultimate Frontier (Namco Bandai, PSP): 81,000
• Friend Collection (Nintendo, NDS): 68,000 (1,288,000)
• Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 (Tecmo, PS3): 42,000
• Wii Sports Resort (Nintendo, Wii): 27,000 (1,253,000)
• Dynasty Warriors Multi Raid Special (Koei, PS3): 27,000
• Tales of Vesperia (Namco Bandai, PS3): 26,000 (292,000)

 

Credit : ps3.ign.com