The Japan Preview: 12/4/11 Edition (Mario Kart 7, Mobile Suit Gundam)4th
Dec Jacob Mazel, 1 hour ago, 307 views
The Japanese video game industry had its first genuinely 'huge' week for software in quite some time with numerous games selling tens of thousands of units and two major titles over 300,000 units.
1) Mario Kart 7 (3DS) - 467,000
2) Mobile Suit Gundam Extreme Vs. (PS3) - 339,000
3) The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Wii) - 80,000
4) Super Mario 3Dland (3DS) - 63,000
5) Kamen Rider Climax Heroes Fourze (PSP) - 55,000
6) Fortune Street / Itadaki Street (Wii) - 43,000
7) Assassin's Creed: Revelations (PS3) - 37,000
8) Kirby's Return to Dreamland (Wii) - 32,000
9) Powerful Pro Kun Pocket 14 (DS) - 26,000
10) Kamen Rider Climax Heroes Fourze (Wii) - 23,000
In addition to the games above, Wii Sports Resort (Wii), Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (PS3), Saint Seiya Senki (PS3), Weiss Schwarz Portable: Boost Schwarz (PSP), and Pop'n Music Portable 2 (PSP) should also chart in the final top twenty data for the week.
Mario Kart 7 was the big opening for the week. To date, it is the largest opening for a 3DS game in Japan although if Capcom ships enough units of Monster Hunter next week the 'record' will only last for a week. On a much larger base, Mario Kart Wii opened to nearly 600,000 units in Japan and currently stands at 3.28m - and so Mario Kart 7 should continue to sell for a long, long time in Japan particularly if the 3DS ends up being larger than Wii as Mario Kart DS has sold over 4m units in Japan by being on a larger platform. Mobile Suit Gundam for PS3 had an opening nearly as good as Mario Kart 7, but will follow the 'spike' pattern and decline very rapidly over the next three weeks.
Outside of the major titles, a lot of games for Nintendo platforms are now holding well - Zelda, Kirby, Pokepark 2, Marioland, and One Piece are all being held up some by seasonal purchasing patterns - if this was any month but December or January they'd all have declined or declined faster. Kamen Riders and Itadaki Street Wii also had pretty good openings for the week given that neither game will decline much on a unit basis until late January. 3DS, Wii, PS3, and PSP should each be up from last week, as they are the main platforms this holiday until Vita launches, and each has had a pretty steady stream of games now for two months.
Looking ahead, there are three major events for the rest of December in Japan. Vita launches mid-month and should open quite well even with 3DS set to achieve obscene figures over the next six weeks in Japan. Capcom's Monster Hunter Portable 3G for 3DS launches December 10th in Japan. Preorders are currently at 405,000 units and should reach right about 450,000 units at launch. Those figures will translate to a 500,000 - 900,000 week one - assuming Capcom ships enough of the game. The current rumor is Capcom is only shipping about 420,000 units for day one, so week one will likely be on the low end of the range presented above. Square-Enix's Final Fantasy XIII-2 launches December 15 for PS3 and now has 280,000 preorders en route to about 350,000 preorders on the eve of launch. An opening of 450,000 - 700,000 units looks likely for the game now, well below the 1.5m opening for Final Fantasy XIII in mid-December 2009, which makes sense as Final Fantasy XIII had 1,030,000 preorders 11 days before launch compared to the 280,000 preorders Final Fantasy XIII-2 has 11 days before launch. Given how quickly Final Fantasy games decline in Japan, it is becoming increasingly unlikely that Final Fantasy XIII-2 will reach even 1m units in Japan over its lifetime. Sony's Vita also does not look like it will have any huge software (at least at brick & mortar retail) initially, as no Vita games currently have more than 20,000 preorders less than two weeks from launch. 3DS for comparison had about five games with over 20,000 preorders at this distance from launch even though the device launched in a non-holiday month.
Contact VGChartz at jmazel@vgchartz.com
日本游戏业终于迎来了第一个货真价实的软件销售周,众多的游戏卖出了上万份,更有两款游戏卖出了超过30W份