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Japanese Hardware: Wii Sales Quadruple On Monster Hunter 3 Launch
by Kris Graft

7 comments

August 7, 2009

Japanese Hardware: Wii Sales Quadruple On Monster Hunter 3 Launch

A few weeks after the Square Enix RPG Dragon Quest IX drove Nintendo DSi sales through the roof in Japan, another third-party game, Capcom's Monster Hunter 3, helped quadruple weekly Wii sales, tracking firm Media Create said Friday.

Japanese sales of the Wii for the week ended August 2 were 95,357, up from about 24,000 units the week prior. Capcom's Monster Hunter franchise is hugely popular in Japan, and previously appeared on PlayStation 2 and PSP. Monster Hunter 3 is the first time the franchise has come to a Nintendo console, and Nintendo appears to be reaping the benefits.

Capcom's website says the Monster Hunter franchise has sold 9.5 million units in total. Monster Hunter 3 sold over 520,000 units in just two days.

DSi sales dropped week-on-week to 73,710 from 80,362. While weekly DSi sales continue to recede in recent weeks, they're still 57 percent higher than they were compared to the week just prior to Dragon Quest IX's release. Including sales of the DS Lite, total DS sales were 85,737.

With the Wii rising to the top of the hardware charts, Sony's PSP dropped to third place for the week with 33,049. PS3, PS2, and Xbox 360 rounded out the charts. The full Japanese game hardware charts for the week ended August 2 are as follows:

Wii: 95,357
DSi: 73,710
PSP: 33,049
DS Lite: 12,027
PS3: 8,760
PS2: 3,617
Xbox 360: 3,552

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Comments

Peter Dwyer

7 Aug 2009 at 11:32 am PST

So they sold around 600k copies of monster hunter but, because the Wii is at such a saturation point, they only generated 95k new Wii hardware sales :)

You've gotta laugh haven't you ;)

Ken Masters

7 Aug 2009 at 3:21 pm PST

Using "95k" and "only" in the same sentence is just wrong. The system has been selling between 18-22k for a few months now - 95k is actually really, really good.

James LeGeros

8 Aug 2009 at 10:51 am PST

If only Microsoft or Sony could manage to reach 95k in hardware sales. (one way to appropriately use 'only' and '95k' in a sentence)

Andre Thomas

8 Aug 2009 at 8:06 pm PST

This isn't new as one of many characteristics of the japanese gaming industry....a single piece of signicant software can push consoles.

As for Sony achieving 95k, expect this when key titles such as GT5 and FFXIII launched.

Peter Dwyer

9 Aug 2009 at 2:55 am PST

Actually the point I was trying to make was that pre-recession, these game and hardware figures would have been seen as the under performing sales figures that they really are. Only shifting 95k consoles on the back of a monster hunter game would have been laughed at. Now it's seen as a major triumph dispite the fact that they have yet to sell enough to even break even!

Fábio Bernardon

10 Aug 2009 at 9:45 am PST

Previous Monster Hunter games for home consoles didn't sold as well as this installment. I don't see where they could further improve it...

gaz mad

14 Aug 2009 at 1:50 pm PST

If that game had been on PS3 instead, the game would be so much better. That would have made real MH fans go out and buy a PS3 for MH3. The PS3 sales would be more han 95k if it had MH3 right now.