Square Enix has just announced that Final Fantasy XIII has shipped over 5 million units worldwide, with at least 3 million of those accounting for US and Europe figures, as reported by Andriasang,

The game has shipped at least 2 million units in Japan since its launch back in December, and by all accounts it looks like it’s going to easily eclipse that success here in the west.

This figure brings sales of the franchise as a whole to a whopping 96 million units in 20 years. Not too shabby.

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According to a recent report by Nikkei, Nintendo’s New Super Mario Bros. Wii has managed to sell over 10 million copies worldwide.

3 million of these sales come from Japan, with more than 4.5 million units being sold in the US, and over 3 million in Europe.

That’s a lot of copies for one singular game to sell.

Looks like Mario still has what it takes to beat the best.

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ELSPA presented some rather interesting software sales figures today. In 2009, the Xbox 360 overtook the (until recently) unstoppable Wii as the biggest software-shifting format in the UK. That’s a first.

The Xbox 360 pulled in £459 million worth of software revenue in 2009, although the Wii sold a higher number of titles in general, shifting over 18 million games last year.

PlayStation 3 finally made itself competitive in 2009, with over 11.9 million games sold to consumers, up 1.5 million from the 10.4 million games sold in 2008.

In total, over 74.6 million games were bought by people in the UK last year, which roughly accounts for one video game per person in the country. If that’s not mainstream, I don’t know what is.

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Based on figures gathered by MCV today, Modern Warfare 2 has sold approximately 1.23 million copies on it’s first day on sale in the UK, according to GfK-ChartTrack.

The figure is impressive. Do you want to know just how impressive?

It’s double the figure of GTA IV’s day one sales (609,000). This makes making Modern Warfare 2 the fastest-selling video game in UK history, with 1,230,588 copies sold in total day one.

This roughly means that Modern Warfare 2 is in approximately one of every 24 UK homes.

Impressive would be an understatement.

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The company also stated that over 7 million pieces of user-created content has been downloaded since the game’s launch. That’s a lot of second hand furniture.

I guess we can label the game a success then.

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The PS2 sees a 40% increase in sales, while the DS sees a whopping 150% increase in sales. Everyone else, on the other hand, took a bit of a beating in April… especially the Wii.

Find all the details after the cut.

Hardware Units

Apr-09
PlayStation 2 172K
PlayStation 3 127K
PSP 116K
Xbox 360 175K
Wii 340K
Nintendo DS 1.04M

Top 10 SKU’s April 2009

Publisher Platform Rank # Units
FIT W/ BALANCE BOARD NINTENDO OF AMERICA Wii 1 471K
POKEMON PLATINUM VERSION NINTENDO OF AMERICA NDS 2 433K
MARIO KART W/ WHEEL NINTENDO OF AMERICA Wii 3 210K
PLAY W/ REMOTE NINTENDO OF AMERICA Wii 4 170K
THE GODFATHER II ELECTRONIC ARTS 360 5 155K
RESIDENT EVIL 5* CAPCOM USA 360 6 122K
NEW SUPER MARIO BROS NINTENDO OF AMERICA NDS 7 119K
MARIO KART DS NINTENDO OF AMERICA NDS 8 112K
GUITAR HERO AEROSMITH* ACTIVISION BLIZZARD (CORP) 360 9 110K
THE GODFATHER II ELECTRONIC ARTS PS3 10 91K

April 2009 vs. April 2008 comparison:
Wii : -52.39%
PS3 : -32.12%
360 : -6.91%
PSP : -39.80%
NDS : +150.72%
PS2 : +38.26%

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According to NPD figures for the month of April, video game software and hardware sales were down 17% for the second month running, compared to sales at the same point last year. The overall effect on the industry is hard to measure though.

Full details from the NPD figures below.

Total sales settled in at $1.03 billion, down from $1.24 billion in 2008.

Hardware sales dropped 8%, to $391.63 million.

Software sales dropped 23%, to $510.74 million.

Peripheral sales were down 15%, sitting $129.45 million.

“While April sales might appear soft on the surface, it’s important to remember that April is being compared against a month (April 2008) that realized nearly 50 percent growth over April 2007,” said NPD analyst Anita Frazier.

“This year’s performance still represents the second-best performance for the industry in the month of April, besting April 2007, which is the previous second-place holder, by 26 percent.”

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Talking to the New York Times recently, Nintendo of America boss Reggie Fils-Aime’s made a rather alarmist statement about the industry; Wii games need to shift at least 1 million units to be profitable.

Reggie Fils-Aime, chief marketing officer for Nintendo of America, said publishers of games for its Wii console needed to sell one million units of a game to turn a profit. He said that was a lower threshold than for the other consoles. Only 16 out of 486 games for Nintendo Wii game machines have sold more than one million units as of March 1, according to NPD, which tracks the sales of consumer products. (Nine of the best sellers are made by Nintendo.)

Mr. Fils-Aime said Nintendo recognized the economics were changing when it developed the Wii. He said the company deliberately did not add high-definition capability to the Wii so games would be cheaper to make.

By those maths, only 3.29 percent of Wii software only ever makes a profit.

Makes you wonder why most companies would bother, surely? Mind you, this figure doesn’t really take into consideration just how many of those titles may be shovel-ware, so it’s not quite as doom-and-gloom as it sounds.

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Well, this is certainly an encourage sign. According to reports from Capcom themselves, Street Fighter IV has completely sold out at retail on its first day on sale in Japan.

The game sold 86,000 copies total in the region, subsequently selling out all available retail copies on both the PS3 and the Xbox 360.

Street Fighter IV launches in the US on February 17, and February 20 in Europe. Will you be rushing out like everyone else to pick up a copy?

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According to recent figures by GfK Retail and Technology Australia, the Australian videogames market experienced huge growth in 2008, of approximately 47%.

Record sales for the industry were recorded in the region, with up to Australian $1.96 billion ($1.30 billion) retailed earned for the country last year. Software sales were up by 57%, whilst console sales rose by 43% and peripherals by 68%.

“Sales figures for the past two years actually show that the industry has grown over 112 per cent since 2006,” said the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia CEO Ron Curry.

“The industry has really witnessed phenomenal growth, which has largely been driven by people playing games together.”

“There is a huge variety of games now on the market, with a wide selection for the entire family as well as specifically for adults, and it’s a great way for people to spend time together,” he added.

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It’s the game that just keeps on giving… today, ELSPA has just awarded Media Molecule’s adorable LittleBigPlanet Gold Status, meaning that Sony’s flagship title has sold over 200,000 copies in the UK.

The game is continue to sell steadily despite dropping out of the UK Top Ten the week after its release, where it debuted at 4th place.

Sony has regularly labelled the game as an “evergreen” tittle, in that it will continue to sell for months to come, the company believes. Sony blamed a crowded holiday season for the title modest debut in the charts.

Personally, I don’t care where it is in the charts. It’s a beautiful game however it sells.

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Blizzard Entertainment has confirmed in a press release today that the new World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King sold 2.8 million copies in its first 24 hours on sale, becoming the fastest selling PC game ever.

The past record holder… ironically… was the previous expansion, The Burning Crusade.

2We’re grateful for the incredible support that players around the world have continued to show for World of Warcraft,” said Blizzard boss Mike Morhaime.

“Wrath of the Lich King contains some of the best content we’ve created for the game so far, and we look forward to seeing even more players log in to experience it in the days ahead.”

A well deserved success for an epic series.

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Over 500,000 players from across the globe have registered for the game since it was launched last week.

“In just one week we have a half a million people playing WAR online, and the ranks of Order and Destruction are growing at a record-breaking pace for a new MMORPG,” says Mark Jacobs the co-founder and general manager of Mythic.

“We spent years working to provide players with the most stable, epic, and polished online world we could, but it is the players that have truly brought the Age of Reckoning to life.”

But there is a key word here. “New”

Generally because The Burning Crusade sold 2.4 million in the first 24 hours, but technically, it wasn’t a “new” MMO..

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Its happened fast, despite the many people complaining about Spore’s DRM.

I do wonder, however, what that number would be if you added the number of pirated copies. And I doubt I’m the only one.

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And to think, some people believe interest in the Pokemon franchise is waning.

Recent figures from Enterbrain indicate that Pokemon Platinum has sold nearly 1 million copies – 967,675 copies to be exact – in its first two days on sale in Japan. Which is… a lot. That has to be some sort of record, surely?

Pokemon Platinum is a updated version of Pokemon Diamond / Pokemon Pearl with a huge number of updates, which include a modified visual design, new pokemon, new locations, and no challenged.

Rather surprisingly, the game doesn’t have any European or US release date yet, which is a bit of an oddity considering how popular “extended” versions of past pokemon games have been in the west. We’ll keep you updated when we find out more.

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