Sony Computer Entertainment Europe has announced that the Singstar series has sold over 12 million units in PAL territories since launching in 2004.

Five million of those sales came in fiscal year 2007-2008, according to the company, in the 12 months leading up to March 31st this year.

The online elements of the PS3 version of the game – released in December - have also provide popular.

According to Sony, in PS3 SingStore’s first four months of trading, one million tracks were downloaded across the PAL region.

Meanwhile, 'social networking’ hub My SingStar Online has attracted 140,000 registered users, who have shared over 20,000 videos of their SingStar performances that have been watched a total of 2.5 million times.

Mark Hardy, Director of Product Marketing of SCEE said:

“The term ‘social gaming’ is widely recognised in 2008 – however, it was relatively new when we launched the first SingStar title in 2004. That game entered the charts at number one in many countries, allowing us to pioneer the social gaming category and a new market of consumers who might not have bought games before. We really are teaching the world to sing with SingStar – and business for 2008 is looking excellent.”

Paulina Bozek, executive producer of SingStar said:

“SingStar’s success is built upon simple and entertaining game play. Historically we have added new music tracks to keep the experience fresh but the arrival of PS3 has allowed us to think differently. We can now take advantage of the next-generation features to take the next step forward in the SingStar experience. The launch of SingStore and My SingStar Online is the realisation of this and the experience is now more user-focused, personalised and interactive."