That single day of sales doesn’t tell us too much about the PSPgo’s reception in Japan, considering Enterbrain only tracked one day, November 1, as part of its weekly sales monitoring window. As for how that compares to weekly figures, the most recent data we have is from sales tracker Media Create, which put non-go PSP sales at 32,865 for the week of October 19 to 25.

We’ll have to see how the rest of the week shakes down, but won’t have that info for a while, since Media Create’s window tracks the same period

Enterbrain did note that the PSP had sold 12,797,180 units in Japan since the console’s launch in December of 2004.

Look, that’s what Enterbrain prez Hirokazu Hamamura said at today’s Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan, according to Bloomberg Japan. And it doesn’t seem unreasonable, considering the PlayStation 3 just sold 150,000-plus units on the strength of a price drop and the release of yet another Gundam game.

Earlier this week, Famitsu polled folks with a “Dragon Quest 9 Pre-Launch Awareness Survey”. It was mostly multiple choice with a few free response questions. Oddly, for the multiple choice question “Do you plan on buying Dragon Quest 9?”, there isn’t a “I’m not going to buy it” reply. Instead, the choice is the more gentle “I don’t know whether I will buy it or not.” Semantics!

Feel free to take the survey yourself.

Do you have a Nintendo DS?

Did you know that Dragon Quest 9 is going on sale on July 11?

Do you plan on buying Dragon Quest 9?

For those planning on buying hardware on launch date. What kind of DS do you plan on purchasing?

What would make you think about buying Dragon Quest 9?

Whom do you think you’d play multi-player?

On launch day, how long would you play Dragon Quest 9?

Do you usually play video games for long stretches?

How many people you know are aware of the Dragon Quest series?

Which previous Dragon Quest titles have you previously played?

Please tell us a memory that’s connected with Dragon Quest!

The survey also asks about the game’s customisation feature and ends with a request to draw Dragon Quest character Slime from memory. Can you do that? Can you?

ファミ通　「ドラクエ９発売前意識調査」　買わない選択肢は無い [Akiba Blog]

The figures were collected from the period beginning March 30 and ending on April 26.

Cherry Blossom Cat is very interested.

Here’s the raw data:

1. Pokemon Fushigi no Dungeon: Sora no Tankentai
Platform: DS
Released: 4/18/09
April sales: 198,424
Life-to-date: 198,424

2. Monster Hunter G
Platform: Wii
Released: 4/9/09
April sales: 142,852
Life-to-date: 142,852

3. Sengoku BASARA Battle Heroes
Platform: PSP
Released: 4/9/09
April sales: 130,969
Life-to-date: 130,969

4. Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G (PSP the Best)
Platform: PSP
Released: 10/30/08
April sales: 92,827
Life-to-date: 648,249

5. Mario & Luigi RPG3!!!
Platform: DS
Released: 2/11/09
April sales: 83,919
Life-to-date: 551,810

6. Pro Yakyuu Famista DS
Platform: DS
Released: 4/2/09
April sales: 66,490
Life-to-date: 66490

7. MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM Senjyo no Kizuna Portable
Platform: PSP
Released: 3/26/09
April Sales: 57,537
Life-to-date: 142,470

8. Jikkyou Powerful Pro Yakyuu 2009
Platform: PS2
Released: 3/19/09
April Sales: 50,958
Life-to-date: 123,800

9. Wii Fit
Platform: Wii
Released: 12/1/07
April sales: 44,678
Life-to-date: 3,313,584

10. Killzone 2
Platform: PS3
Released: 4/23/09
April sales: 43,028
Life-to-date: 43.028

April Sales [Famitsu]

Figures from Famitsu publisher Enterbrain show the margin between the two to be considerable. Enterbrain’s figures, via Reuters, put the PS3 at 108,530 consoles sold compared to the Wii’s 67,116. It’s been purely about software the past two months, as Sony has benefited from titles like Resident Evil 5, Musou Orochi Z and the Final Fantasy XIII demo.

The two-month period breaks a 16 month long streak that had the Wii dominating hardware sales charts. Can they keep it up?

Sony PS3 outsells Wii for second month in Japan [Reuters]

This has led many to proclaim that the Wii’s golden run in Japan is over. That the fickle Japanese public have had their fill of the waggling novelty, and have moved onto the next “big thing”.

A look at the bigger picture, however, shows that such drastic proclamations may be, if not without merit, then at least a little dramatic. After all, it was only last week that Enterbrain figures showed that Nintendo had sold 8 million Wiis in Japan, a strong performance from a machine that only went on sale in Japan in December 2006.

That announcement from Enterbrain was hardly the first. Similar proclamations were issued after the machine had sold 1, 3, 5, 6 & 7 million consoles as well. Which was considerate of them, yes, but it also allows us to go back and chart the sales growth of the Wii.

And as you can see, despite a slight sales slowdown just before Christmas last year (around the 18-24 month mark), the first half of 2009 has seen Wii sales on a pace not far off those seen during the machine’s “prime”.

It’s important to note that this graph is taking a long view, with sales averaged out over the time between “million sold” announcements, rather than directly reflecting month-to-month sales. So the “recovery” the Wii has staged in the last five months will have lumped the holiday season in with more recent performances.

But you know what? When talking about the overall fortunes of a console, sometimes it’s best to take the long view. And this long view suggests that while Enterbrain’s “9 million sold” announcement will probably show a decline in Wii sales growth, it’s a relative term when applied to such a successful console.

The Nintendo Wii launched in Japan on December 2, 2006 and was not packaged with Wii Sports like in The West.

Enterbain also released new top five Wii software sales totals. They are:

1. Wii Sports
Launch: 12/2/06
Life-to-date: 3,481,469 copies

2. Wii Fit
Launch: 12/1/07
Life-to-date: 3,301,373 copies

3. Wii Play
Launch: 12/2/06
Life-to-date: 2,672,811 copies

4. Mario Kart Wii
Launch: 4/10/08
Life-to-date: 2,218,756 copies

5. Super Smash Bros. Brawl
Launch: 1/31/08
Life-to-date: 1,789,924 copies

Wiiの国内累計販売台数が800万台を突破 [Famitsu]

With the PlayStation 3 outselling the Wii in Japan for the month of March, one might think that Nintendo executives are in a panic, concerned this whole motion control thing is a fad. Not so!

Nintendo seems rather nonplussed by the monthly change in console domination on its home turf, which by Enterbrain’s figures meant 146,948 PlayStation 3s sold in the five weeks to March 29 versus 99,335 Wii units sold.

Enterbrain’s figures are a little different from the Media Create hardware sales data we regularly follow. We have PS3 sales at 116,000 for March, with Wii sales just under 70,000, looking at a four-week period.

“It is still the first few months of the year when sales are slow for the industry, so we are not particularly concerned,” Nintendo said.

Nintendo says that the current software slump affecting Wii sales overseas isn’t cause for worry, as it hopes “to line up strong software to support hardware sales in the second half of the year”. With Wii Sports Resort coming at some unknown point this year, we’d imagine that’d do the trick!

PS3 outstrips Wii in Japanese sales [Financial Times]

No more breaking it down into individual markets. Combined sales data released this morning from GfK, ChartTrack, Enterbrain and the NPD Group shows us the five biggest-selling games in the world for 2008.

And there are few surprises, as the Wii speaks a universal language. Three of the top five titles for the year were published by Nintendo, on the Wii, with the other two spots taken by GTA IV and Call of Duty. Indeed, the only surprise comes from the order of Nintendo’s titles, Mario Kart’s massive European sales helping get it over the top ahead of Wii Fit.

1. Mario Kart Wii – 8.94 million
2. Wii Fit – 8.31 million
3. GTA IV – 7.29 million
4. Smash Bros. Brawl – 6.32 million
5. Call of Duty: World At War – 5.89 million

Goes to show the advantage of having a game be successful across all three major regions – ie the Nintendo games – as opposed to those only popular in the US & Europe.

Mario Kart world’s biggest seller in ‘08 [MCV]

But what comes after it? Well, it makes for some depressing reading.

Here are the top 5, including lifetimes sales as of November 16.

1. Metal Gear Solid 4 – 671,706
2. Hot Shots Golf: Out of Bounds – 408,175
3. Dynasty Warriors 6 – 371,443
4. Dynasty Warriors: Gundam – 317,580
5. Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 – 316,533

People wonder why the PS3 is under-performing in Japan, that list is why the PS3 is under-performing in Japan.

Enterbrain: Best Selling PS3 Games In Japan So Far [PS3Hyper, via PS3F]