Post-Christmas sales of Mario & Sonic At The Olympic Games have helped push Sega’s Q1 revenues for 2008-2009 up 90 per cent to 30.5 billion Japanese yen ($279.6m).

The result, for the three months to March 31st 2008, means that the division reduces its operating loss from 7.2 billion yen ($66m) to 4.1 billion yen ($37.62m).

Software sales were up all over the globe, with 6.89 million units sold worldwide in total – with 3.16 million units sold in the US, 2.89 million units in Europe and 830,000 units in Japan and other regions.

Total global shipments of Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games topped seven million, while US and European sales of Iron Man hit 1.8 million units. Sales of Valkyria Chronicles reached 147,000 copies in Japan.

However, the news wasn’t quite as good for the company’s parent, Sega Sammy, which posted an operating loss of 10.29 billion yen ($94.5m) for the period - and a net loss of 10.5 billion yen ($96.4m) Net sales fell 21.8 per cent to 74.6 billion yen ($684.8m).

The company said the results were in line with forecasts and made no changes to its FY guidance. Sega Sammy expects current fiscal year sales of 470 billion yen, an increase of 2.4 per cent from FY 2008. It predicts consolidated operating income of 15 billion yen and net income of 5 billion yen.