Heavy Rain makes a splash in Japan

By Robert Purchese Published 26 February, 2010

Resi 5: Gold Edition top of the pile.

Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition - the re-release with added DLC - has shambled to the top of the Japanese software chart this week.

The PS3 version sold 143,339 units to take top honours, according to Media Create data extrapolated on NeoGAF. The Xbox 360 version, on the other hand, was nowhere to be seen.

Other notable newcomers were Heavy Rain (sixth) and Dante's Inferno (14th on PS3, 35th on Xbox 360). Despite a top 10 finish, Heavy Rain only shifted 26,775 units.

Namco Bandai's PSP Monster Hunter clone, God Eater, was pushed into second place, followed by New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Dragon Quest VI (DS) and Friend Collection (DS).

Wii Fit Plus, Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's World Championship 2010: Revenge of Arcadia (DS), Star Ocean: The Last Hope (PS3) and Wii Sports Resort rounded out the top 10.

In the hardware stakes, Sony and Nintendo were nearly neck-and-neck.

DS took the lead with a combined 44,821 units sold (DSi XL sold most), followed by PSP with 34,167 units, PS3 with 32,130 units and Wii with 31,652 units.

Xbox 360 sales were even lower than normal at 2453 units, and PS2 bottomed the pile with 1883 units.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (23) Latest comment 2 years ago

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

  • schnide #1 2 years ago

    Glad to see Microsoft have learnt the lessons of Xbox 1 and are making headway in Japan, and..

    ..doh!

  • lockload #2 2 years ago

    "Glad to see Microsoft have learnt the lessons of Xbox 1 and are making headway in Japan, and..

    ..doh! "

    Glad to see sony have learned their lesson from being profitable with the ps2 and done the same with the ps3...doh

  • Feanor #3 2 years ago

    "They simply will not buy it because it is American, no matter what MS do. Is there a word for that?"

    Apple products are American, and they sell in Japan.

  • Steroyd #4 2 years ago

    Wow looks like RE5's Gold edition being available as DLC only on the Xbox 360 might have influenced the sales chart a little bit.

  • Doctor_What #5 2 years ago

    Japan is still an important market in respects to the game industry, not least because many of the major publishers have incredibly strong ties over there.

    There is still a strong vein of smiling-xenophobia in Japan - not out of any malice, more from an ingrained cultural belief that the rest of the world is full of uncouth barbarians with no manners who are more interested in personal advantage than social harmony (which is pretty accurate). This means, among other things, that lots of the games associated with the 360 don't really appeal. The 360 did sell much better when there were a few JRPG launches, but the sales dropped again when more of those games didn't appear.

    It's not very shocking really: a console with few games that appeal to a territory doesn't sell very well in that region. Add to that the hurdle of not being a Japanese product then it's always going to be near impossible to make in-roads.

  • Steroyd #6 2 years ago

    When the 360 was the only Next Gen console the Japanese wouldn't buy it, when the PS3 had hardly any great games for an age the Japanese wouldn't buy it, when MS lowered the price the Japanese wouldn't buy it, when they recruited some of Japans best known developers names to make games for the system they wouldn't buy it.

    WRONG!

    The Xbox 360 experienced sales spikes when Blue Dragon, Tales of..., Star Ocean 4 and some other decently franchised Xbox 360 temp exclusive RPG games.

    However MS is at a stage where the Japaneese devs don't see a big benefit in going exclusive to the Xbox 360 in Japan anymore, and it's crippled what little leeway they had, now that such games can be found on the PS3.

  • Darren #7 2 years ago

    I wonder how well the 360 version of FFXIII would have sold in Japanese had it been released as traditionally that series sells a lot of units (several million) not to mention hardware so people can play it on? Strange that the one RPG that would more or guarantee good sales is not being released over there when mediocre stuff like Star Ocean 4 and Lost Remnant were. :?

  • JonFE #8 2 years ago

    I don't think it's strange Darren. Bringing FF13 to the x360 was bad enough, although perfectly understandable from a business point of view, if you take into consideration both consoles' installed base; releasing the x360 version to Japan as well could seriously jeopardize Square-Enix's ties with Sony, with no additional benefit, if you consider x360's tiny base there...
    Edited by 1 at 26/02/10 @ 14:18

  • patchbox360 #9 2 years ago

    @paddy29

    its noisy and breaks alot

  • Moonprince #10 2 years ago

    Ps2 catching 360?

  • GamesConnoisseur #11 2 years ago

    Japanese gamers separates Japanese and everything else. Well known fact and admitted by Japanese, not exactly racist but pretty close by our standard.

    This is reported in an detailed article in current Edge or Game magazine, interesting read and where affects their own industry.

    So MS problems is the norm and Apple an exception.

  • Dizzy #12 2 years ago

    >Apple products are American, and they sell in Japan.

    That is about the only US product that actually sells in Japan.

    Yea and European luxury items and food.

  • Murton #13 2 years ago

    However MS is at a stage where the Japaneese devs don't see a big benefit in going exclusive to the Xbox 360 in Japan anymore, and it's crippled what little leeway they had, now that such games can be found on the PS3.

    That's not a view that is exclusive to Japan or indeed the 360. It's getting to the point now where very few (third party) devs/publishers see a benefit in limiting themselves to a single platform. The chief driver of this attitude is costs, if games are going to cost 20, 30, 50 million USD to produce, then you need to make sure that everyone who wants that game can actually buy it, otherwise you're going to make less profits or even incur a loss from the title.

    On the subject of Heavy Rain I was expecting a much better placing for it, I'd have thought that style of game would prove very successful in Japan. Though my experience of the first few hours of the game lead me to take the opinion that it will repeat the pattern set by Omikron and Fahrenheit and see average sales in the opening week or two and then a belated spike as the word of mouth gets around.

  • MDL199 #14 2 years ago

    Is being anti American and anti greedy American business outfits like Micro$oft a bad thing? Personally i'm with the Japs! Oh and just maybe the Japs are anti crappy made consoles that break down every few months, just a thought like.

  • spookyzombie #15 2 years ago

    I wish people wouldn't go on about 360's breaking anymore. Working in games retail, I can honestly say we have hardly any problems with returns since the new jasper units came out.

    Heavy Rain sold out by 3pm today. I hear the supermarkets in the area sold out quickly too. Popular game.

  • Widge #16 2 years ago

    Yeah, I popped into Asda on the way to work and a few people were buying it and the bod behind the counter said it'd sold quite a few too.

    I hope it sells well and Quantic make another game and this time I can black out all gaming sites for big fat spoiling idiots ahead of release.

  • Steroyd #17 2 years ago

    Awesome, I hope Heavy Rain sells well, they were onto a winner with Fahreinheit excluding the 2nd half of the game, but this news is kind of bitter sweet to me because I opted to get White Knight Chronicles instead and with it selling well HR isn't going to drop in price quickly which is good but bad.

  • ronuds #18 2 years ago

    "Is being anti American and anti-greedy American business outfits like Microsoft a bad thing?"

    Yes, because only MS is greedy. Nintendo and Sony are all for the people.

    Jackass...

  • KDR_11k #19 2 years ago

    They simply will not buy it because it is American, no matter what MS do.

    You sure it has nothing to do with the console's infamous failure rate coupled with Microsoft's reputation?

  • davisorle #20 2 years ago

    Its funny to read and comming back to check this website and notice that the audience of it is still the same retarded when it comes to the ones that vote. paddy29 stated facts and got slaughtered. lmao I agree with him and so pls, do me the favor and minusrate me too if that makes u happy just cause... ( i really dont know why but for the reasons u did to him I guess )

    On topic: Nothing surprising in the charts in Japan.

  • BritishBlue1 #21 2 years ago

    Lot of racists here accusing the Japanese of being racist. Generalisations are bad mmm-kaaay.

  • Beano #22 2 years ago

    "Lot of racists here accusing the Japanese of being racist. Generalisations are bad mmm-kaaay. "

    It's not racism to belive other people are racist - wrong or not, it's just stereotyping at worst.

  • Widge #23 2 years ago

    lol @ you