You make a good point, but  seems to me that the ratio of westerners who buy Japanese games/systems is much higher than the ratio of Japanese who buy western games/systems. That's my point. Obviously the Japanese do purchase Xbox 360 and Halo, but not at the same rate that westerners buy Final Fantasy. The same goes for racing games. They might be more popular in Europe, but they are still plenty popular in North America. It's all about ratios and it seems to me that Japan is out of wack with the rest of the world. How can it be that one tiny nation disagrees with the rest of the people on the planet. It's not 100%, nothing is, but if the rest of the world likes something it stands to reason that the Japanese would too if they gave it a chance.

I doubt even a reviewer would scores FFXIII 40 out 100 would claim it's of poor quality. There are plenty of games I hate but still consider high quality. I hate Final Fantasy Tactics, but I consider it one of the finest crafted games around. High quality, but I'd score it low. FFXIII is a high quality game with love it or hate it gameplay. The gameplay is finely tuned and of the highest quality but some reviewers didn't like it. That doesn't make it any less of a quality game. There are people who apsolutly rail against Halo, I don't understand it, but some people hate it. That doesn't change the fact that each game in the series is among the highest quality FPS of their day. I don't see how Japan can be the only nation that doesn't "get it". I don't expect everyone to love it, but you'd think the same ration of people would.

snfr said:

The PSP of course is very successful in the west overall. But it's still doing great in Japan while at the same time it's doing bad in Europe and America, that's what I meant. The PSP can surely be considered as a success, but PSP's time in the west is over, in Japan it's far away from being dead.

In Japan, PSP probably has another 6-12 months before it's as dead as the west.  3DS is literally going to slaughter it, and even Wii has a more attractive lineup for 2011 at this point.  I can't imagine any developer greenlighting a big PSP title at this point, why bother? 

Well, who knows? It's definitly a possibility that it will be dead in 6-12 months, but I wouldn't be so sure about that. In 2011 there will be at least FF Agito XIII for the PSP, and a price cut could keep it healthy another 6-12 months. The 3DS will hurt its' sales for sure IMO, but I don't think it will die very quickly.

I don't know much about upcoming games on PSP to be honest, because Agito XIII is the only thing that interests me, but I guess we might see the last big titles for it in 2011.

AGITO XIII will be the most pirated game in the PSP like Dissidia. They should have released it for 3DS instead. Better graphics and online.

FF Agito XIII and WKC Dogma Wars are basically the only big-ish PSP games for 2011 or later afaik.  There's not really anything else that could clear, say, 200k.  Unless some of 2010's big games get delayed or something... TGS should be telling as to how exactly PSP will fare next year.

I should also point out, I think 3DS is also going to wipe out DS almost immediately (though big DS games should still do well thanks to backwards compatibility), and I also think 3DS will cannibalize what little 3rd party support Wii has left (though that's not such a big loss at this point).  Only the HD twins will remain (somewhat) unscathed.

Metroid will increase next week in EMEAA when it has more time on the market than a single day, and can likely drive some hardware with it.

DS numbers are actually the lowest they've been in a long time. Used to do 300,000 per week without any trouble. Of course the USA price cut for DS is September 12, so there will be a nice rebound there heading into Christmas depending on when / if the 3DS launches.