14 DAY TRIAL // Mario Kart 7, the Nintendo 3DS bound racer from Nintendo, has managed to regain the number one position in the Japanese video games chart for the week that ended on December 25 as supplied by research firm Media Create.
The week was especially important because it is one of the biggest shopping periods of the year and is then followed by months of smaller releases and lower sales.
Mario Kart 7 has managed to sell 260,836 copies during the seven day period and has gone up from third to first place while the second position on the podium was picked up by a new entry, Warriors Orochi 2 from Koei Tecmo, which was launched on the PlayStation 3 and has managed to sell 200,626 units during its first week.
Third place has been occupied by Super Mario 3D Land from Nintendo, also for the 3DS, with sales of 174,566 and the good performance of the device has been underlined by Monster Hunter Tri G from Capcom, which has moved another 155,069 to gamers.
After a rather disappointing first week in Japan Final Fantasy XIII-2, the JRPG from Square Enix, has continued to underperform during its second week on sale, when it only managed to occupy fifth place in the Japanese chart with sales of 118,816.
The rest of the top ten is made up of: Kirby's Return to Dream Land from Nintendo, Just Dance Wii, SD Gundam G Generation 3D from Bandai Namco Games, Inazuma Eleven Go: Shine / Dark from Level-5 and Inazuma Eleven Strikers 2012 Xtreme.
The big trend for the week has been the disappearance of all PlayStation Vita titles from the top ten, which is not a good sign for the long term fortunes of the new handheld from Sony.
All the games are also sold digitally via the PlayStation Network, which might be compensating for the lack of physical sales.