DS drops 82 per cent of its sales on native shores
PSP picks up 15 per cent of them
Admittedly, that 82 per cent figure is there for impact - according to figures crunched by NintendoDojoFR on Japanese annual hardware sales figures, the DS saw an inevitable drop after two sensational sales years, so it’s not likely to be causing any perturbing chest pains at Nintendo.
It does suggest a likely train of thought as to why the Big N brought out the handheld’s hardware update the DSi when it did. Looking at the massive DS sales spike at the end of 2008 it’s easy to see the kind of immediate impact the new system had on Japanese gamers, and really saved Christmas for its manufacturer.
The PSP noticed a similar boost thanks to its hardware improvements in the PSP-3000, with the console picking up an extra 15 per cent on 2007’s sales figures.
Despite improved sales, Sony’s struggling system still only managed to overtake the DS a couple of times, however, and was licked quite thoroughly once the DSi (briefly) hit the shelves.
Japan is a country of early hardware adopters, of course, and its gamers love to stand in line at midnight to get their hands on the first shipment of new toys.
When looking at other national sales figures, as our own Jon Jordan did yesterdy for the UK, we can see that overall the PSP saw a 27 per cent drop over 2007 - almost exactly the same amount of extra sales the DS enjoyed, despite the rest of the world not yet seeing the hardware update that saved face for Nintendo of Japan.
A 28 per cent increase in UK DS sales was recorded, though these impressive figures had the edge taken off them when they revealed that the average profit margin per game was reduced.
Could that be anything to do with sudden and aggressive competition from the iPhone and it’s wonderfully cheap games?
Yeah, probably.
