14 DAY TRIAL // The launch of Monster Hunter Frontier Online and the introduction, by Microsoft, of a new, smaller and better looking Xbox 360 home console have allowed the device to go on a surge in terms of sales in Japan, selling better than some versions of the Nintendo DS family and actually threatening the position of the Wii in the hardware chart.
The Nintendo DS family is the best seller overall, with the DSi LL still feeling the effects of a price cut that Nintendo introduced in an effort to move more of its handhelds ahead of the launch date for the 3DS version, which is set to come later during this year.
The DSi LL succeeded in selling 41,676 units, which is significantly better than the 30,183 it did during last week. Meanwhile, the PlayStation Portable from Sony took second place in terms of sales, also seeing a modest increase in units moved, from 20,929 to 23,357. Third place in the hardware chart went to the PlayStation 3 home console from Sony with sales of 19,578, an increase of about 2,000 over the previous week.
The Nintendo Wii moved 19,115 devices while the Xbox 360 has seen the biggest increase of the week, going from 2,060 to 17,370. It will be interesting to see whether the Microsoft made platform manages to keep this momentum. The DS Lite, the PlayStation 2 and the PSP Go are all behind the Xbox 360.
In the software charts, Monster Hunter Frontier Online, from Capcom for the Microsoft home console, sold 93,000 units in its first week and will likely continue to sell well in the coming weeks. Second place went to another new entry, Love Plus+ from Konami for the DS, with sales of 84,000 units. Aterlier Totori: alchemist of Arland 2 from Gust for the PS3 is in third place, with 54,000 copies moved, while Tokimeki Memorial: Girl's Side 3rd Story from Konami is forth ahead of Super Mario Galaxy 2.