japan prefers handhelds more then consoles these days, and thats no lie, the HW sales from each brand will tell ya...

I've got the theory that Japan is a market heavily influenced by the software geared towards them, they aren't highly into the western games, and most Japanese support has consistantly been on the handhelds rather than the consoles.

Hand helds sell a lot better

Ps2 didnt have any decent comp to split console sales with

The Wii didnt have no decent comp. But now the PS3 is a desired console in Japan. For the first time ever the consoles sales are divided

I blame:

Handhelds & PS3

Devs were all on the PS3 ship at the start, then they slowly moved to the wii ship, but still with most on the PS3 ship

now PS3 is selling as well as the wii & in 2009 sales it may beat the way ( a hug acomplishment)....so once again this will STALL the moves developers may make to wii.

Handhelds have risen in popularity by too much & the PSP made it worse, you could play home console type games in your palm, so whats the use of a home console? That mentality may have arisen.

I think you really should be comparing it to the DS.

Unfortunately, there has been a shift in terms of the dominating platform, where the home system has become the alternative secondary system type. You should compare the Wii with the Gameboy Advance IMO.

LOL Just noticed my typo in the thread title... *sigh* we really do need an edit title function heh

comapring sounds cooler maxwell so its kay!

I feel we need to change the perspective when it comes to japanese gamesales. It´s clear that this generations dominating system in Japan is DS. It doesn´t matter if it is a portable. It still is the dominating system in Japan.

Evidence on this is also the huge amount of titles that traditionally went to homeconsoles from japanese developers that now are on the DS (and also PSP). Dragon Quest which always finds a home on the leading system (NES,SNES,PS1,PS2) is now on DS, that says a lot.

DQ will be on the Wii aswell... Anyway it is both the DS/PSP that take the software away from PS3/Wii. I guess without PSP their would be a lot more software releases on Wii/PS3 and probably even more on DS;

Yes hopefully DQ stays on Wii. But the main point stays the same, this generations winner in Japan is DS. Not Wii (my favorite), not PSP, not PS3. Portable consoles compete with homeconsoles this generation in Japan in a much bigger way than before so I think it is only right to compare them.