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The Japan Preview: 11/27/11 Edition (Zelda Wii, 7th Dragon 2020) - News

by VGChartz Staff , posted on 28 November 2011 / 8,330 Views

Japanese software sales have arrived for the week ending November 27, 2011. Total software remained at about the level of last week on solid openings for Wii and PSP games.

1) The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Wii) - 165,000

2) 7th Dragon 2020 (PSP) - 140,000

3) Saint Seiya Senki (PS3) - 55,000

4) Super Mario 3DLand (3DS) - 48,000

5) Metal Gear Solid: HD Edition (PS3) - 44,000

6) Weiss Schwarz Portable: Boost Schwarz (PSP) - 38,000

7) One Piece: Gigant Battle 2 - Shinseka (DS) - 36,000

8) Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (PS3) - 33,000

9) Ninokuni (PS3) - 32,000

11) Pop'n Music Portable 2 (PSP) - 26,000

11) Danball Senki Boost (PSP) - 26,000

12) Taiko no Tatsujin Wii: Ketteiba (Wii) - 22,000

13) Kirby's Return to Dreamland (Wii) - 16,000

15) Final Fantasy Type 0 (PSP) - 15,000

15) Sengoku Basara 3 Utage (PS3) - 15,000

In addition to the games above, Just Dance Wii (Wii), Wii Sports Resort (Wii), Saints Row 3 (PS3), Hatsune Miku: Project Extend (PSP), and Ore no Shikabane o Koete Yuke (PSP) should be in the final top 20 data for the week.

Nintendo's first console Zelda game in five years topped the charts this week, coming in at the low end of the range presented in the past few weeks. After finishing with 103,000 preorders, Zelda opened to 165,000 units week one. Sega's 7th Dragon sequel did nearly as well and opened at a better figure than Sega's last 7th Dragon game which bodes well for the franchise if week two is not substantially down.

The result is not bad for Zelda, as games in the series have not topped 1m units in Japan for over well over a decade now. The last Zelda to top 1m units in Japan was Ocarina of Time which opened to 146,000 units in 1998. A Link to the Past for the SNES topped 1m on a 300k+ opening, and data for the NES Zelda games is not available. Wind Waker opened to 360,000+ in Japan for the GC, but never got to even 900,000 units, while Twilight Princess for Wii & GC sold 640,000 lifetime on a roughly 150,000+ combined opening week. It is nearly impossible to say how well Zelda will sell in Japan currently, as the series is heavily dependent on word of mouth in Japan. What we can say is that the franchise is well below Monster Hunter, Pokemon, Dragon Quest, and a handfull of other games capable of Zelda's lifetime figures in less than week - its just nowhere near a top tier franchise in Japan as it is in the West.

Call of Duty had a major drop off from last week, and should essentially follow the path of previous entries in the series at a slightly higher level until the next game in the series releases. One Piece, Ninokuni, and Kirby Wii had solid holds from last week, and Metal Gear Solid continues to follow the non-HD to PS3 / HD pattern of other games, opening at about 10% of what the original game did.

Looking ahead, preorder trends look similar to previous weeks. Monster Hunter Portable 3G (3DS) now has 345,000 preorders and should end up at around 400,000-430,000 preorders before launching December 10. Those numbers should translate to a 550,000 - 800,000 week one. Mario Kart 7 launches for 3DS on December 1. The game has 180,000 preorders and will be right around 200,000 preorders at launch. Those figures should amount to a 300,000-400,000 week one in Japan. Final Fantasy XIII-2 for PS3 has almost 240,000 preorders through November 27, 2011 ahead of its December 15, 2011 release. On November 29, 2009, Final Fantasy XIII had 900,000 preorders ahead of its December 17, 2009 release. That means Final Fantasy XIII-2's preorder pace continues to fall further and further behind the Final Fantasy XIII pace each week. Final Fantasy XIII-2 is currently trending for 280,000-350,000 preorders which would be a 400,000 - 550,000 week one - a massive drop from the 1.5m week one Final Fantasy XIII opened to week one. Preorders for Vita titles are steadily rising as well now - look for more on how those games will perform in two weeks.

Contact VGChartz at jmazel@vgchartz.com


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27 Comments
Tridrakious (on 28 November 2011)

I would like to see last weeks numbers before we start seeing this weeks.

  • +16
markimsoad (on 28 November 2011)

I would like to see last weeks numbers before we start seeing this weeks. [2]

19/NOV SALES PLS! TKZ!

  • +12
acdcste (on 28 November 2011)

How about you get week ending 19th November's numbers up before posting previews for this coming week. These figures are taking far too long to be added, considering its now dinner time on the 28th November.

  • +5
Carl (on 28 November 2011)

Ni no Kuni having a good hold makes me smile. I hope word of mouth carries it through the holidays!

  • +3
kingofwale (on 28 November 2011)

for those of us who don't know

what the heck is "7th Dragon" and why is it selling almost as well as Zelda?

  • +3
outlawauron kingofwale (on 28 November 2011)

I want to say it's the sequel to a critically acclaimed DS game, 7th Dragon. It's made by imageepoch and published by Sega. I really wish either of the two made it to the US, they're supposed to be quite good.

  • +2
kopstudent89 (on 28 November 2011)

@thesource
Ocarina of Time (N64) sold 480k FW!! Not 146 k! That was the the 3DS version
http://gamrreview.vgchartz.com/sales-data/2399/the-legend-of-zelda-ocarina-of-time/

  • +2
Wappy (on 28 November 2011)

I think that Nintendo will dominate from here to a couple of weeks more, since Mario Kart 7 and Monster Hunter 3G will released one after another. Good for them and let's see if those titles can lift 3DS sales over the 100,000 units.

  • +2
MARCUSDJACKSON (on 28 November 2011)

looks great overall

  • +2
FinalEvangelion (on 28 November 2011)

Here is to hoping Ni No Kuni will perform better in the next few weeks.

  • +1
cyberninja45 (on 28 November 2011)

I bet a lot of people are pre-ordering the 3DS/MH bundle. But is that number included for MH3G pre-orders. If its isn't MH might be even more of a monster than it looks now.

  • +1
JTurner82 (on 28 November 2011)

Under the circumstances, GREAT JOB, ZELDA. You've earned the top spot. Although not the strongest opening, it still beats that of OoT and TP's. Kudos.

  • 0
kopstudent89 JTurner82 (on 29 November 2011)

It didn't beat OoT, it beat OoT 3D not the original game!

  • 0
JTurner82 JTurner82 (on 29 November 2011)

@kopstudent89; sorry, I meant OoT 3D. Whether it'll go pass ZELDA TP remains to be seen, but for now, this is a decent opening overall.

  • 0
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Galvanizer (on 28 November 2011)

Man, Zelda is not a big seller in Japan. :(

Totally sucks seeing as it's been around as long as Dragon Quest over there. 165,000 first week for Zelda: SS is low. Even a Final Fantasy spin-off like Dissidia can do more than that in Japan.

Speaking of FF, it really looks like FFXIII-2 will not open to over 1 million first week in Japan. That will be shocking if it's the case. It will be the first main series FF game to not open to over 1 million since FFIV on the Super Famicom.

  • 0
HansW Galvanizer (on 28 November 2011)

It's not a main series FF game, it's a disc-version of DLC aka stuff that should be in the original game.

  • +3
Kai Master (on 28 November 2011)

Zelda is a weird series, you hate it or love it, I hated TP but by brother loved it. To me the best Zelda was the first, then the 3rd and then the 2nd, 3D ones never appealed to me (Ocarina was still ok at the time but the next ones were archaic and uninspired, TP is so N64-era and I'm too grown up to like Zelda anymore). I really hope the E3 demo with the HD Zelda will translate into a great mature Zelda game. oh, by the way, still no F-Zero game announced, is the series terminated ?

  • 0
italo244 (on 28 November 2011)

Modern Warfare 3 outsold Zelda FW... EVERYWHERE!

fix'd

  • 0
Kai Master italo244 (on 28 November 2011)

I didn't notice, that's the end of the world ! Anyway, MW3 won't sale more than Zelda in the long run, the worst selling Zelda game, Twilight Princess, sold 640k units, and the best selling CoD game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, sold 440k and the series is a bit in the downturn. But Zelda is highly in the downturn... maybe the unbelievable thing could happen !

  • -1
ryuzaki57 (on 28 November 2011)

Modern Warfare 3 outsold Zelda FW... in Japan!

  • -1
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MontanaHatchet (on 28 November 2011)

Super Mario 3D Land isn't having as strong a hold as I expected. The legs might pan out long term, but it's dropping off a lot more than I thought it would.

  • -3
Wappy MontanaHatchet (on 28 November 2011)

It is doing fine, I mean, not great but fine. It has been in the 4th position since the week after its release.In fact, its sales haven't been affected by any new releases, so I would say that Super Mario 3D Land's sales are
stable.

  • +2
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JTurner82 spurgeonryan (on 28 November 2011)

Well it could have been much worse. It could have sold BELOW 100k! So on that level it didn't do too bad. Of course it's only marginally better than TWILIGHT PRINCESS' opening bow, but under the circumstances I think the debut is pretty decent. At least it didn't bomb.

  • 0
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