In Japan last week:

01. DS Nishimura Kyotaro Suspense Shin Tantei Series: Kyoto Atami Zekkai no Kotou - Satsui no Wana (DS) - 61,000 / New
02. Dragon Ball Z: Sparking! Meteor (PS2) - 47,000 / 251,000
03. Gundam Battle Chronicle (PSP) - 28,000 / 114,000
04. Pokémon Mysterious Dungeon: Time Expedition Party (DS) - 26,000 / 502,000
05. Arcana Heart (PS2) - 23,000 / New
06. Pokémon Mysterious Dungeon: Shadow Expedition Party (DS) - 22,000 / 440,000
07. Lair (PS3) - 22,000 / New
08. ASH: Archaic Sealed Heat (DS) - 17,000 / 67,000
09. KanKen DS 2 + Jouyou Kanji Jiten (DS) - 16,000 / 67,000
10. Flash Focus: Vision Training in Minutes a Day (DS) - 16,000 / 631,000
11. Tamagotchi no Puchi Puchi Omisecchi: Mina San Kyu (DS)
12. Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII (PSP)
13. Mario Party 8 (Wii)
14. Tashiten: Tashite 10 ni Suru Monogatari (DS)
15. Jikkyou Powerful Major League 2 (PS2)
16. Dragon Ball Z: Sparking! Meteor (Wii)
17. Mario Kart DS (DS)
18. Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops+ (PSP)
19. Wii Sports (Wii)
20. New Super Mario Bros. (DS)
21. My Housekeeping Diary (DS)
22. Taiko Drum Master DS (DS)
23. Jissen Pachi-Slot Hisshouhou! Hokuto no Ken 2 (PS2)
24. Brain Age 2: More Training In Minutes A Day (DS)
25. Project Gotham Racing 4 (Xbox 360)
26. Namco Museum DS (DS)
27. Animal Crossing Wild World (DS)
28. Arabians Lost: The Engagement on the Desert (PS2)
29. Wii Play (Wii)
30. Mario Strikers Charged (Wii)

This is a slow period for Japan.
Interesting that PGR4 for the 360 show up in the top 30. This may be spill over from the HALO effect. I think the 360 is atleast in the Japanese mindshare now.

Lair debuts fairly unimpressively considering there are well over a million PS3 owners in Japan...

I expected DBZ to do better on both the PS2 and Wii than it has... This version is online for both the Wii and PS2... I know it will be a day 1 purchase for me. I loved last year's Wii launch title.

@MikeB

Agreed, it is difficult to track the actual machines for purchase, let alone experiences of their durability.

I'd personally consider buying a Falcon if I'd know which one really has one in it. Got to wait I guess - I'm thinking of saving my launch-day Xbox 360 as a spare. I'm being realistic about these things.

P.S. JB-Hifi Blu-ray exclusivety was discussed here earlier this year, I came across this:

"Sony & Blu-ray Lose Exclusive JB Hi-Fi Deal"
http://www.smarthouse.com.au/HD/HD_DVD/J8T5Q8M5

@BrianK

Also note that was the week prior to the Japanese pricedrop of available PS3 models.

@jtsiren

Reports of RRoD with regard to Falcon boards are hard to track due to the way Microsoft mixed up both types of units (most consumers won't open their box themselves to confirm what's inside). The GPU is said not to be 65nm at all, it seems this only regards the CPU which isn't really believed to an important factor in causing RRoD problems.

A new board codenamed "Jasper" with 65nm GPU is however said to be in the works and should hopefully hit the market somewhere in 2008.

Last edited by MikeB on 17-Oct-2007 at 08:37 PM.
Last edited by MikeB on 17-Oct-2007 at 08:22 PM.

@BrianK

Good XBox 360 sales, XBox 360 sales for the week which ended on the 7th of October there were only 1,547 units sold according to MediaCreate, maybe they some were holding out for the Elite version. With regard to PS3 figures, note the cheaper 40GB version is going to be released in a couple of weeks in Japan as well.

@MikeB

Quote:

New PlayStation 3 SKUs boost sales 178 per cent http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=29633

Who wants to bet the run up was on the 60GB models with the introduction that backwards emulation on 40GB models was going the way of the Do-Do?

EDIT: Looks like I was spot on...
According to PSPSPS, almost 90% of people buying a PS3 opted for the 60GB model which included two games for only £50 more than the 40GB model which did not include games
End EDIT

In related news
Last Friday, the Xbox 360 Elite went on sale in Japan. By the end of the day, the black HDMI console with a 120GB HD sold out at several major Akihabara retailers. AsoBitCity, Gamers, Messe Sanoh and Sofmap sold through all their Elites on launch day.

Last week's Japanese 7th Gen Console sales
Wii 24000
PS3 8400
360 7100

Last edited by BrianK on 17-Oct-2007 at 06:20 PM.

There is now a PS3 thread, maybe this market discussion could be taken there?

I'm actually following this thread for the topic of any developments on the Xbox 360 quality front...

@MikeB

sustained sales, Mike

It's all about sustained sales...

Interesting:

US holiday wishlist for 2007, according to Solutions Research Group (SRG) for Digital Life America:

1) HDTV
2) Laptop
3) Digital Camera
4) Desktop computer
5) Car GPS system
6) New Cell phone
7) Video Camera
8) Nintendo Wii
9) PS3
10) Blu-Ray or HD DVD player

Note, this is by far the XBox 360's strongest market.

Also within the UK PS3 have now surged beyond XBox 360 sales figures, due to the arrival of the cutdown 40 GB PS3. The UK is the XBox 360's strongest market within Europe.

New PlayStation 3 SKUs boost sales 178 per cent
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=29633

Last week's Spain games chart:

1. FIFA 08 (PS2)
2. FIFA 08 (PS3)
3. My Sims (DS)
4. Halo 3 (360)
5. FIFA 08 (PSP)
6. WWE Smackdown! vs. RAW 2007 (PS2)
7. FIFA 08 (PC)
8. Heavenly Sword (PS3)
9. Más Brain Training (DS)
10. Los Sims 2: Bon Voyage (PC)

It will be interesting to see how this holiday season develops, things certainly seem to be heating up.

@jtsiren

Although I don't completely disagree, developing outstanding games for a new platform always takes some time. Surely there will be more games available this holiday season than I have time playing. I am getting R&C: TOD and probably one or two other games in addition to my PSN purchases, most likely Uncharted and Singstar.

@MikeB

Quote:

You just download that R&C demo available on the PSN.

In all seriousness, I think R&C is going to rock.

However, equally seriously, Sony really needs to step up the gaming galore for PS3. I think they have been too focused on hardware changes and their media station thinking, it does make their position a bit more difficult this holiday season within the gaming crowd than I think many predicted.

@jtsiren

You just download that R&C demo available on the PSN.

I already made my pre-order, I got a free 512MB USB stick for pre-ordering.

The real catch is that the XBox 360 must be working.... (Wet towel trick?)

Last edited by MikeB on 13-Oct-2007 at 03:16 PM.

@MikeB

Great deal indeed, you turn in your Xbox 360 and games and then you play... exactly what?

Great article!

"Is Sony as desperate as it looks?"
http://crave.cnet.com/8301-1_105-9794764-1.html?tag=cnetfd.mt

Great deal!



But there's a catch, as you can read in the small print below.

While Microsoft’s Halo 3 pushed almost 60,000 copies during its debut week in Japan, the game has now slipped out of the top thirty entirely.

New entries dominate the latest chart, taking the top five places. Twenty Nintendo platform titles make the top thirty, including fifteen for DS, as do ten PlayStation platform games.

The top thirty for the week ended October 7:

01. Dragon Ball Z: Sparking! Meteor (PS2) - 204,000 / New
02. Gundam Battle Chronicle (PSP) - 86,000 / New
03. ASH: Archaic Sealed Heat (DS) - 50,000 / New
04. Dragon Ball Z: Sparking! Meteor (Wii) - 40,000 / New
05. Jikkyou Powerful Major League 2 (PS2) - 35,000 / New
06. Pokémon Mysterious Dungeon: Time Expedition Party (DS) - 34,000 / 475,000
07. Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII (PSP) - 30,000 / 680,000
08. Pokémon Mysterious Dungeon: Shadow Expedition Party (DS) - 29,000 / 418,000
09. KanKen DS 2 + Jouyou Kanji Jiten (DS) - 23,000 / 51,000
10. Tamagotchi no Puchi Puchi Omisecchi: Mina San Kyu (DS) - 20,000 / 74,000
11. Taiko Drum Master DS (DS)
12. Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops+ (PSP)
13. Mario Party 8 (Wii)
14. My Housekeeping Diary (DS)
15. Mario Kart DS (DS)
16. New Super Mario Bros. (DS)
17. Mario Strikers Charged (Wii)
18. Eiken DS (DS)
19. Animal Crossing Wild World (DS)
20. Flash Focus: Vision Training in Minutes a Day (DS)
21. More Brain Age (DS)
22. Wii Sports (Wii)
23. Wii Play (Wii)
24. Guitar Freaks & Drum Mania V3 (PS2)
25. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (PS3)
26. Bakumatsu Renka: Karyuu Kenshi-den (PS2)
27. Shinseiki GPX Cyber Formula: Road to the Infinity 4 (PS2)
28. More English Training (DS)
29. Brain Age (DS)
30. Bleach Blade Battles 2nd (PS2)

from next-gen.biz ...

@BrianK

Quote:

Summary: Injuries reported: 0 Total sold: 230K+ Reported w/ issues: 70 % wheels with problems: ~.03% % wheels without problems: 99.97% Total houses burned down: 0

Well, those stats are more like they should be. Anyways, my wheel hasn't had a problem - I did send the retrofit form a few weeks ago but still haven't heard anything from Microsoft.

@MikeB

Update came out from Microsoft concerning the steering wheels which you were worried about burning down your house.

Summary:
Injuries reported: 0
Total sold: 230K+
Reported w/ issues: 70
% wheels with problems: ~.03%
% wheels without problems: 99.97%
Total houses burned down: 0

@jtsiren

Quote:

@MikeB Quote: According to my sources a new 40 GB PS3 will become available around the 10th of October, most likely without card readers, 2 USB ports (instead of 4) and without Wi-Fi costing around 399 Euros. Shoud sell well. Is it also without PS2 backwards compatibility? Sony is getting back to the roots, that is good - now get those games out there, wi-fi etc. not everyone needs (like was discussed with regards to Xbox 360 anyways). A smart move, even if funny considering some past bravado.

Wi-Fi is still included, the PS2 GPU was taken out. So without future firmware updates only PS1 games will work out of the box (currently).

@Lou

Quote:

Lou wrote: @BrianK Word on the street is that Bungie is going to be sold or go independent but MS is keeping the rights to HALO... I guess HALO DS is a reality afterall... http://blogs.ign.com/Matt-IGN/

Statements from Bungie have come out.

Bungiehas just announced that they've "reached an unprecedented and exciting agreement" that Bungie will "branch off" from Microsoft Game Studios and become Bungie, LLC, an independent company...We’ll continue to make Xbox 360 games, and we’ll continue to make amazing games for MGS. In that regard, nothing has changed. All that has changed is that now Bungie Studios is once again, the property of the folks of Bungie Studios. Microsoft is and will continue to be, a brilliant, inventive and creatively collaborative publishing partner. Practically speaking, nothing has changed and you guys won’t see much, if any difference, for a while

Looks to be Microsoft has a minority share, but probably a vocal one. 360 is likely to still be their primary platform. My guess is that it will be easier to go multiplatform with their games. Nothing about handling of the Halo Franchise but I can't see Microsoft giving up a one week $300M product, that'd be very dumb.

Last edited by BrianK on 05-Oct-2007 at 05:03 PM.

Reviews of Bioshock and HALO 3
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/zeropunctuation/1394-Zero-Punctuation-BioShock

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/zeropunctuation/2304-Zero-Punctuation-Halo-3

Please review them in that order.
;)