Oddly enough, we start with Japanese numbers instead of American.
| This Wk | Last Wk | Name | Wks Sales | Total Sales | % Drop | Wks in Release | Expected LTD |
| #1 | ---- | The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion | 43,676 | 43,676 | --- | 1 | 100,000(?) |
| #2 | #1 | Ghost Recon: AW2 | 2,275 | 14,907 | -30.5% | 3 | 20,500 |
| #3 | #2 | Trusty Bell: Chopin's Dream | 1,404 | 65,615 | -11.0% | 7 | 75,000+ |
| #4 | #3 | Saints Row | 660 | 15,948 | -21.9% | 6 | 17,500 |
| #5 | #6 | Blue Dragon | 592 | 194,461 | +2.4% | 34 | 200,000+ |
| #6 | #5 | Forza Motorsports 2 | 510 | 26,294 | -16.6% | 9 | 30,000 |
| #7 | #8 | Viva Pinata | 385 | 17,716 | -13.3% | 29 | 19,500 |
| #8 | #7 | Dead Rising | 339 | 78,545 | -37.8% | 44 | ~90,000 |
In this week's chart, we have the obvious standout: Oblivion. Everyone was rather caught off guard on this one when Shinobi reported retailer preorders. Originally, I was figuring this game would be lucky to manage 20,000 LTD sales. Fortunately, it totally smashed the Eastern Curtain. It wound up with very similar numbers to Trusty Bell, minus the bundle. Actual hardware sales were higher for Oblivion than Trusty Bell if the TB Bundles were not included (Famitsu stated that 3,000 X360s were bought during TB week that weren't bundles).
Where will it end up? No one knows. Juding by the fact it had 35,000 sales first day, it only managed a paltry 4,000 per day afterwards. If one was to take that as ancedotal evidence, you could assume 65,000 LTD sales, surpassing Gears of War, or near it. However, it''s still managed to chart well on Amazon. Hopefully with the good reviews it can manage more. Oblivion certainly had great legs in the US for the X360, despite a huge opening.
Most games benefited from the increased hardware sales. Most notably JRPG friends Blue Dragon and Trusty Bell. TB managed a phenominal drop, and Blue Dragon, an increase. Trusty Bell will easily flirt, and surpass #4 Ridge Racer 6 at some point, hopefully. Ghost Recon 2 also managed a real good hold for it's 3rd week - possibly spurrned by Western owners adopting X360s for Oblivion. However, Dead Rising wasn't so lucky, and neither Saints Row. Both posted abysmal drops.
Next week is going to be real interesting for Oblivion. It could wind up with a 65% drop ala Ghost Recon, or a 85% drop like Trusty Bell.
NA Charts soon....Now!
| This Wk | Last Wk | Name | Wks Sales | Total Sales | % Drop | Wks in Release | Expected LTD |
| #1 | #1 | NCAA Football 08 | 106,293 | 467,834 | -70.7% | 2 | ~1,000,000 |
| #2 | #2 | Nascar 2008 | 70,159 | 70,159 | --- | 1 | 250,000(?) |
| #3 | #3 | Guitar Hero 2 | 26,783 | 1,032,565 | +7.2% | 17 | 1,500,000+ |
| #4 | #2 | All Pro Football 2k8 | 22,506 | 76,737 | -58.5% | 2 | ~210,000 |
| #5 | #7 | Overlord | 12,504 | 148,668 | -18.9% | 5 | 275,000+ |
| #6 | #9 | Gears of War | 11,940 | 2,832,002 | N/A | 38 | 3,500,000 |
| #7 | #6 | The Darkness | 11,803 | 204,012 | -23.4% | 5 | 300,000 |
| #8 | #5 | Transformers | 11,331 | 164,021 | -40.9% | 5 | ~225,000 |
| #9 | #8 | Forza Motorsports 2 | 10,208 | 463,385 | -17.1% | 9 | 575,000+ |
| #10 | #10 | Call of Duty 3 | 10,187 | 1,107,344 | -11.5% | 37 | 1,3000,000 |
As I figured, NCAA08 has a massive above-60% drop. It's not surprising. If anyone doesn't understand the frontloadedness (a word?) of NCAA08, it's very simple. Everyone wants their copy of the next iteneration of football to see where their favorite/new players ability ratings are, as well as who might win the year, well before it happens. NCAA08 and Madden are real great at "simming" seasons, and is rather accurate with who will win various games (somewhere in the 70-80% range, as good as some of the best real-life predicters). Expect a smaller drop. Suprisingly, the other versions of it dropped just as bad. Expect NCAA08 for X360 to garner the pole position for this MP game, and wind up with near 1m.
Next up is redneck racing: Nascar 2008. Suprisingly (to me), it does well overall, and does even better on the X360. It garnered well above 50% the total sales of the franchise. Since the season is almost half over, sales should remain rather steady, and it should be en route to 250-280k.
Outside of this, no new major news. Overlord continues to have decent, good drops. GOW stays strong, and GuitarHero 2 is still a beast. It'll easily get near 1.5m before GH3/Rock Band start stealing away sales.
Next week: with no new X360 games in Japan, expect a huge drop. It could be anywhere from 7.5k to 15k for software. Hardware should be around 3,000 units.
Also, in the US, with no new games, expect sales to hover around 375-400k for the week. Hardware? Who knows. The price drop *might* of been in effect, but I think it'll show up only after this week. 35k until then.
Back from the dead, I'm afraid.
