So, I've already posted this in the Vita thread, but this is a sales site and I like talking about sales so I thought I'd make a separate topic about it to open things up to a wider discussion.

So Sony recently released their digital sales rankings for Japanese PSN in 2013 (credit to BaldrSkies for bringing this up):

http://www.jp.playstation.com/psn/store/sp/131227storerank2013/?ref=rss

Overall:
#1 Dragon's Crown - Vita
#2 Dragon's Crown - PS3
#3 Super Robot Wars Operation Extend Pack - PSP(+Vita)
#4 God Eater 2 - Vita only
#5 Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus - Vita
#6 Toukiden - Vita only
#7 Soul Sacrifice - Vita
#8 Earth Defense Force 4 - PS3
#9 Demon Gaze - Vita
#10 Summon Night 5 - PSP(+Vita)

Download-only:
#1 Super Robot Wars Operation Extend Pack
#2 Rain

(I've only highlighted the parts I'm going to be referring to, but there's plenty more in the link including top 10 rankings for Vita; PS3; PSP & PS1).

Rain ranked as #2 in the download-only charts, being beaten by only the Super Robot Wars Operation Extend Pack which showed up at #3 in the combined chart.  Rain did not make the top 10 combined.

A while ago, Famitsu announced they were going to start tracking digital sales starting in January 2014.  As a taste of what was to come, they gave us the charts for September & October.  I've found the chart here which I copied straight from neoGAF, but if you're looking for a different source you can search through the Media Create archive on GAF or alternatively ask Hiska-Kun as I believe he was the one who originally posted it on VGChartz (in the COMG thread, which is a chore to go through to find a specific post).

Anyway, what I wanted to highlight here was this:

14. [PS3] Rain (Sony Computer Entertainment) {2013.10.03} – 0 (36.488) / 36.488

The number in parentheses is the digital sales for the game (the "0" is because the game wasn't released physically).  That's the sales in October alone for Rain according to Famitsu, not taking into account any sales made in November or December.

As Rain didn't show up in the top 10 combined chart, if the Famitsu numbers are correct then every single title in the top 10 chart must have sold more than 36,488 digital copies in 2013 (likely higher than this since Rain would have also sold some copies in November and December, but we don't know what they are so that's all we have to go on for now).

For Vita games, this means some wildly varied attach rates.  Take for example Demon Gaze:

LTD Physical sales = 72,377.  Famitsu Digital sales = > 36,488.  That means the game sold an extra ~ 50% through digital sales.

To use an example from the other end of the spectrum, God Eater 2:

LTD Physical sales = 335,143.  Famitsu Digital sales = > 36,488.  That means that the game sold an extra ~ 10% through digital sales.

All of this analysis is based on the assumption that Famitsu's download figures were correct for Rain.  And obviously, it doesn't give us any more than a "lowest they can be" guess for what digital sales are for these titles.

Just wanted to throw this open to discussion since this is the first look we've had at Vita digital sales figures aside from the numbers we were given by Famitsu (which weren't massively impressive).  It seems like on a title-by-title basis games can have good or average digital sales on Vita.

If I've made any mistakes, feel free to point them out and I'll change/lock the thread!

vg should acknowedge these numbers.... and any official release

Tbone is that you?

You cut me deep, bro :'(

thats messed up :-/ I was right about LoZ on 3DS (US) digital sales being 70k+ by end of Nov (vgc just had it overtracked for retail)

Surprising that Dragon's Crown vita top the ps3 version but sold less then it physically.

Why would that be surprising? Handhelds will do better with digital content, and the Vita is designed around digital purchases.

Just how much faith can we have in Famitsu? Are those official numbers? Something seems a bit off with Demon Gaze that low and God Eater 2 that high yet the unit difference is that small.

Though, I think games with pre-order bonuses and special editions cut into first week digital sales quite a bit. After that, the percentage should keep rising.

No idea.  But it's literally all we have to go on for the time being and since they are the only company providing any kind of digital estimate.

Someone of GAF was saying that Terraria had ~ 54k digital sales on PS3.  I genuinely don't have the time nor energy to source that up at the moment but if true, that'd mean that everything in the top 10 would be > 27k, so still a pretty hefty number (and I'd trust SC to be more reliable than Famitsu).

The thing with Demon Gaze was that it was sold out at retail for its first week (as with Monster Monpiece) so that might have led to people buying a digital copy due to the game getting extremely good word of mouth.

You've also got to conisder that there's a gap between Demon Gaze & God Eater on the chart.  Realistically with DG at #9 and GE at #4 we could be looking at ~ 38k for DG and something more like ~ 50k+ for GE or even higher.

Vita has more digital sales in my country most of the games are released only in digital at good price instead of retail. And i've purchased more than 300$ worth of games in Vita through digital only not a single game in retail so far from a year of gaming.