Metal Gear Solid 4 tops Japanese chart

By Robert Purchese Published 19 June, 2008

Outsells runner-up 12 times over.

Japan has gone absolutely bananas for Metal Gear Solid 4, snapping up over 465,000 copies in the game's first week on sale.

That's nearly 12 times more than closest competitor Mario Kart Wii at 38,000 sales this week, according to Media Create data.

The effect MGS4 has had on PS3 sales across region is still unknown, with Famitsu apparently reporting upwards of 70,000 units sold. Last week, in the run up to MGS4 release, the PS3 spiked only marginally, commanding 10,865 sales.

Which would paint a rather different picture to the UK, where MGS4 was described as having a "minimal effect" on hardware sales. Japanese hardware results should come in tomorrow.

The rest of the software chart saw Nintendo best-sellers Mario Kart Wii and Wii Fit take two and three, and the early success of Konami PSP baseball fading to four.

Following was PSP unit-shifter Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G at five, and some sort of new DS Pachinko game at six that has such a long name we've decided to spare your eyes.

PS3 fighter Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit tumbled down to seven, ahead of Beautiful Letter Training for DS at eight and Kyoto Murder Files at nine.

Mysterious Dungeon 3 rounded the list off at 10.

The full top 40 was made up of 15 games on DS, nine on Wii, three on PSP, two on PS3 and one on PS2.

That top 10 in full:

  1. Metal Gear Solid 4 Guns of the Patriots (PS3) - 465,000
  2. Mario Kart Wii (Wii) - 38,000 (lifetime: 1,444,000)
  3. Wii Fit (Wii) - 37,000 (lifetime: 2,227,000)
  4. Jikkyou Powerful Pro Baseball Portable 3 (PSP) - 27,000 (lifetime) 187,000
  5. Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G (PSP) - 26,000 (lifetime: 2,203,000)
  6. Hisshou Pachinko Pachislot Kouryaku Series DS Vol. 2 CR Shinseki Evangelion ~Shito, Futatabi~ (DS) - 22,000
  7. Dragon Ball Z Burst Limit (PS3) - 18,000 (lifetime: 111,000)
  8. Beautiful Letter Training (DS) - 17,000 (lifetime: 285,000)
  9. DS Yamamura Misa Suspense: Kyoto Murder Files (DS) - 17,000 (lifetime: 56,000)
  10. Mysterious Dungeon: Fuurai no Shiren 3 (Wii) - 14,000 (lifetime: 73,00)
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 (22) Latest comment 4 years ago

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

  • Scurrminator #1 4 years ago

    of course hardware sales were unaffected in the UK, we didn't have a bundle with the frickin dual shock 3!

  • ParanoidZombie #2 4 years ago

    "Hisshou Pachinko Pachislot Kouryaku Series DS Vol. 2 CR Shinseki Evangelion ~Shito, Futatabi~ (DS)"

    ... WTF is that?

  • consignia #3 4 years ago

    @ParanoidZombie It must be the portable version of the Evangelion themed Pachinko machine that's all the rage in Japan at the moment.

  • jovus #4 4 years ago

    @Nick_JC1
    It did not sell 5 times more.... didnt you read that number in the brackets that says Mario Kart Wii (Wii) - 38,000 (lifetime: 1,444,000) so its like less than 3 times..

  • chris_ace #5 4 years ago

    Post deleted at 11:55:13 13-12-2011

  • CannonAnBall #6 4 years ago

    I don't know how you can say the figures aren't a success because it is.

  • drumbaby #7 4 years ago

    If MGS4 was on the Xbox 360 it would still only sell 3 Msoft consoles in Japan.

    A month.

  • CitizenGeek #8 4 years ago

    Obviously, Nick_JC1 doesn't know what he's talking about. Those are great sales figures, and like others have already said, well deserved.

  • GamesConnoisseur #9 4 years ago

    Good sale figures yes, but of more interest if PS3 will pick up the consoles sold on week by week basis after the first week. As MSG4 should be a 'system seller' but MSG series have always been much more popular in the West than in Japan, so we perhaps should not expect too much of the change to the sale pattern?

  • L42yB #10 4 years ago

    Impressive...

  • bitesize #11 4 years ago

    The Wii is a massive failure for any serious gamer.

    whereas for those of us who don't take things too seriously, it's a massive win. i know which i'd rather have...

  • aldo_14 #12 4 years ago

    The Wii is a massive failure for any serious gamer.

    Er why? (and does that matter?)

  • Waffleaber #13 4 years ago

    "The full top 40 was made up of 15 games on DS, nine on Wii, three on PSP, two on PS3 and one on PS2"

    Which adds up to 30 titles in a top 40.

  • GamesConnoisseur #14 4 years ago

    Wii doesnt excite me, glad for Nintendo as another generation of dominance by Sony would not do us gamers any good in my view, and being second would only encourage Sony to up their game a lot more than being king of the hill would have been.

    PS3 is a good multi purpose console but annoyed with Sony tendencies for 'overpromises' (doesnt need to mention which as there is plenty to choose from!) and the different regional tiers, especially for us poor Europeans.

    However yes, for us selfish gamers there is lots more to be excited about with PS3 than Wii, but Wii is a far better one for the whole family as evidently in my home.

  • Olemak #15 4 years ago

    Just a note: the PS3 has sold about 2 million units in Japan by may 1st this year. So - either 25 % of all japanese PS3 owners bpught a copy, or the bundle effect is rather significant. MGS4 looks like a serious system seller for the japanese market. Not so much in the states or over here, of course, but it will still impact system sales somewhat.

  • penguin_overlord #16 4 years ago

    Apparently, the PS3 outsold the Wii worldwide in the past week and outsold the 360 by 3:1. There's now less than a 6 million gap between the PS3 and 360 and that could be down to 5 million by the end of Summer.

  • Gaol #17 4 years ago

    @Olemak

    Actually it wa a serious system seller in the US because of the dual shock bundle. Retailers were pissed off with the amount provided and say Sony could have sold many times more.

    The reason the effect is minimal in the UK is no bundle has been launched, its still the same old sixaxis standalone box.

  • penhalion #18 4 years ago

    The thing I like about the Japanese chart and coincidentally the missing thing that makes the UK charts useless, is that they include all the numbers. Here we see that everyone who wanted metal gear in japan went out and got it day one. It's still almost a million units in sales behind Mario kart and nearly 2 million units behind both Wii Fit and Monster Hunter. This stops the fanboys from making rediculous claims about it's popularity as they have to wait for the next weeks sales to see if it does indeed sustain this seemingly amazing sales spike, or fizzle out. Over a Million units for the coming months will be classed as good I think.

  • penhalion #19 4 years ago

    @Gaol

    The reason the effect is minimal in the UK is no bundle has been launched, its still the same old sixaxis standalone box.

    Sorry to disagree with you but, the reason it hasn't sold here is because people have a hell of a lot better things to do with 300 quid than but a PS3. In England and across most of the world, there are purse strings tightening all the time. In the coming months it's going to be virtually impossible for anyone to justify forking out for a 300 quid console instead of paying the mortgage.

    Only idiotic analysts think that the credit crunch doesn't affect games or console sales.

  • Widge #20 4 years ago

    I have to start paying for my PS3 next month..... :(

    Littlewoods jobbie! I was hoping to put £50 a month aside until my payment date, but that FAILED rather dramatically. Now I've got 3 lumps of £150 or so to divvy up! Well, at least I get a bonus this month, may put that towards it.

  • makeamazing #21 4 years ago

    "Only idiotic analysts think that the credit crunch doesn't affect games or console sales."

    Well I'm not saying recessions do not affect purchasing decisions, but to say the PS3 and people wont buy it because its £300 is crap.

    Didnt affect me or my purchasing decision, perhaps you should stop listening to the newspapers, radio and TV who have been saying there is a major problem for over 12 months... my situation is perfectly fine at the moment and didnt stop me buying a PS3. Of course if i go out of a job then that would change, but im not, and seen this many times before.

    And to say the reason the PS3 didnt sell more is because of the credit crunch is pure tosh.. The PS3 has been selling more consoles recently when we are apparently in the middle of a crunch, so that argument is pure rubbish. I would say if the world is in recession, why is it that the PS3 sold more in Japan these last two month... oh thats right world recession...
    Edited by 2 at 19/06/08 @ 18:16

  • moles200 #22 4 years ago

    Nick_JC1
    19-Jun-08 11:49:06

    And Mario kart has sold 5 times more than MGS4 so this slight bump for PS3 in Japan means nothing. The console is a massive failure over there and it takes a blockbuster like MGS4 to shift the same number of PS3's that Wii sells every single week. Nice bump, but the console is still fooked, roll on Final Fantasy to see PS3 sales break the 10k barrier again.

    Why are you so bothered whether the console is a massive failure over in Japan-mabe get a life or something-sad -it just amazes me the amount of fuss people make over a games console-and wether its successful or not-so answer the question why do you CARE so much?

    Same as the thread regarding the mgs4 score of 8-over 2000 replies sad-at least it reminds me why i rarely read or post on gaming forums anymore-(