UK Charts: Ten weeks at the top for EA

By Paul Loughrey Published 14 February, 2006

NFS: MW refuses to relinquish the lead.

Aided by an improvement in retail supply for the Xbox 360 console, EA continues its unassailable dominance of the top of the sales chart as Need for Speed: Most Wanted claims its tenth week at number one.

The multi-format racer has matched the record set previously by EA when the last game in the franchise, Need for Speed: Underground 2, topped the Christmas charts and lead the UK software sales for ten weeks at the beginning of last year.

As multi-format sales continue to climb for the title, it becomes increasingly likely that EA will set a new record for the longest serving all-formats number one title since Who Wants To Be A Millionaire in 2001.

The publishing giant has featured prominently in the higher end of the sales chart for months now, and the situation is no different this week as EA claims all but one of the top five chart positions. The Sims 2 holds firm in second place, and Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer 5 is stealing third while FIFA 06 and Rugby 06 cling to fourth and fifth respectively.

Ubisoft movie tie-in Peter Jackson's King Kong, which snuck into first place for a brief few days just after Christmas, slips another place from five to six this week - whilst the company's Rugby Challenge 2006 remains static at number seven.

Take-Two's PSP offering, Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories, grips eighth place, and a slight shuffle at the lower end of the top ten sees Lucasarts' Star Wars: Battlefront II jump a single place from ten to nine - making way for Nintendo's new entry, DS title Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time.

The remainder of the chart remains in a relatively stationary state with the only remarkable change being a dramatic downward turn in sales for some titles, such as Microsoft Game Studios' Dead or Alive 4 - an Xbox 360 exclusive that leap into first position before being shunted unceremoniously from the top of the charts and showing a disappointing further decline from last week's number six to this week's 17.

Few new releases scheduled for this week are likely to make any significant impact on the all-formats chart, and although continued improvements in the retail situation for Microsoft will certainly boost the overall software sales the impact of the latest console hardware transition on the industry looks set to continue, at least in the short term.

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Comments (14) Latest comment 6 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • stonedben #1 6 years ago

    whhhhhhhhhhhy?

  • Furbs #2 6 years ago

    1) Cos its not too bad
    2) Publishers are idiots and dont release anything in Jan/Feb.

  • stonedben #3 6 years ago

    Most Wanted is "not too bad" in the way that crack is "not too bad".

  • tannerd #4 6 years ago

    Have you actually played it properly, or are you just subscribing to the EA stereotype?

    I thought it was quite good, and I wouldn't normally touch a NFS game. Not the best game ever, but the charts are quiet at the moment.

  • stonedben #5 6 years ago

    Yes, I've played it properly. I also played Underground 1 and 2, for general lack of anything else to do. Most Wanted made me feel less dirty, but it's far from a good game.

  • Whizzo #6 6 years ago

    What's wrong with it then?

  • tannerd #7 6 years ago

    Not a good game, or just one you didn't enjoy?

  • RabidMonkey #8 6 years ago

    Most Wanted is "not too bad" in the way that crack is "not too bad".

    I'm sure you would know, stonedben.

    And for the record, I haven't played NFSMW and probably never will.

  • Razzajazz #9 6 years ago

    It's quite enjoyable in a 'I've been lobotomized' kind of way. As long as you don't expect anything intelligent from it, it's not too bad. Oh, and the cutscenes contain some of the most hilarious overacting this side of an Uwe Boll film!

  • Retroid #10 6 years ago

    NFS:MW's demo on the 360 isn't bad, but it'd have to be far better for me to lay down some sovereigns.

    /Plays 'evade' mode again in the demo

  • Zuiyo #11 6 years ago

    However the single game that sold most copies was EA's Rugby 06 for PS2...

    Eurogamer should explain this is a "franchise" chart which takes all Most Wanted versions for all platforms as the same game and calculates the copies sold by adding up the sales figures across all machines.

    Is this fair? I don't believe it so, because it gives a distorted view of the market and emphasises multinational publishers with the strength to release in many platforms at the same time. In this particular the case, I believe ridiculous to consider the DS version of the game to bein the same as the Xbox one.

  • myiagros #12 6 years ago

    Zuiyo - you make an excellent point. publishers like EA are willing to similarly name completely differnet titles to ensure high chart placings. For example the PSP and DS versions of the Sims 2 were nothing like the PC original but were given the same name so sales would be totted up together in the charts.

    I think it is resonable if identical ports such as many multiformat, PS2, Xbox and Gamecube games are grouped together, but not completely different games which just happen to have the same name.

    Going back to the sims 2 example it would be perfectly reasonable for someone to own 3 copies of this game(console, PC and handheld), each of which are entirely different, but EA could add the sales up cumulatively.

  • kgthatsme #13 6 years ago

    well it's difficult to draw the line as to whether a game is the 'same' as on another format. I think all the versions should be kept separate.

  • azurelas_2 #14 6 years ago

    At least Pro Evo is doing better than FIFA