2015's been over for quite some time, so let's look back to what happened in Japan in it.
This thread covers the period from December 29th 2014 to January 3rd 2016, which is 53 week long period, and for those asking, software data here comes from Famitsu, hardware data is from Media Create and full software results are from Dengeki.
I made a thread six months ago about the first half of the year, so get nostalgic and click here to see what changed since then.
Monster Hunter back on top of the software list in a long time, not since Portable 3rd on the PSP in 2010. Top 10 best selling software are all on Nintendo platforms, just like last year, this doesn't happen often so it's impressive. The big surprise of the year however is Splatoon, it's the first home console game that sold a million units in the same calendar year it came out since Final Fantasy XIII on 2010, for the time being is also the best selling console game of the generation and the best selling Wii U, for a platform like WiiU and the current state of the home console market that's extremely impressive.
Yokai Watch Busters also did extremely well, it's already outsold the best selling Pokémon spin off, the delay of Yokai Watch 3 surely helped, but the game performed really well, Level 5 is managing the series well giving the game a full game worth of free DLC by the start of December. Talking about other spin offs, Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer also did very well.
Minecraft on Vita also did very well, it's currently the best selling game on the system, and was the best selling SKU on PlayStation platforms for the whole year, on other games, Dragon Quest Heroes, Call of Duty: Black Ops III, Metal Gear Solid V and Bloodborne also performed well, PS4 is starting to warm up as more and more games have started to sell better on it, things should only get better.
Onto breakdown by system.
That's for those results, now full software results.
Vita gets a bunch of games, not surprising, though most of them don't sell much, still the support the platform gets is very impressive.
Actual software sales tell a very different story though, were 3DS is half of the total market, the three PlayStation systems were fighting for second place through most of the year, though none of them ever got close to the 3DS. Wii U had a decent year compared to previous performances, had it reciebed larger games prior to May it may have sold more software than the PS3. Here's another way too look at this.
And here's how the software totals grew for each consoles throughout the year.
Open in another tab for a better look.
Keeping the talk on software, but now with publishers, this were the biggest publishers in 2015.
Nintendo keeps it's hold in Japan, as they've been the largest publisher every year since 1998, results are also on par (ever so slightly) from 2014. Nintendo's software totals incresed by double since July, as they sell most of their games on the later half of the year, them being the only ones to release games on WiiU also helps.
Apart from that, with the exception of Bandai Namco everyone else sold less software than 2014 and software as a whole is down.
Now, everyone's favorite, hardware.
Weekly results for the whole year, open in another tab for a better look.
Comparing to last years results.
PS4, Wii U and the New 3DS models all up YoY, everything else is down.
As for the consoles down, the best performing was the Vita, by the start of 2015 a much bigger drop was expected, so it did well, thanks to Minecraft. Apart from that, the original 3DS models have completely collapsed, which is understandable, the aging PS3 is also going away, finally the Xbox One is of course down, after an absolutely awful year.
As for the positive results, well they're very good, more releases and a price drop pushed the PS4 up, while Splatoon and a good Holiday took the WiiU to an unexpectedly good year, the New 3DS models now being available for a full year did good too, which was expected.
YTD growth throughout the year, check when the streams cross. Open in another tab.
New 3DS ended the year on top, PS4 a somewhat close second, PSV rather far away.
Strong holidays performance kept Nintendo as the #1 hardware manufacturer, while both results are positive for them, 2015 as a whole was one of the lowest years for both hardware and software totals.
