Switch sales up 46% in Japan ahead of Splatoon 2 launch

Nintendo Switch sales rose 46 per cent in Japan last week, according to the latest figures from Famitsu, suggesting Nintendo’s boost to production is finally coming into effect at Japanese retail.

The console shifted over 36,000 units last week, allowing it to take a 44.7 per cent market share of Japan’s total hardware market. That’s without the support of Nintendo’s next big Switch title, Splatoon 2, as well, which launches next Friday on July 21st, showing there’s still plenty of demand for Switch despite there being no new releases last week.

PS4 sales, meanwhile, remained fairly steady, despite Bandai Namco’s new Gundam Versus title going straight in at No.1 in Japan’s weekly software chart.

Gundam Versus sold over 121,000 units during its first week on sale, making it the first chart-topper to sell over 100k since Nintendo’s ARMS on Switch back in the third week of June. That said, Gundam Versus’ launch still pales in comparison to its 2014 predecessor, Mobile Suit Gundam: Extreme VS Full Boost, which sold over 266,000 units in its first week.

The only other new entry last week was D3 Publisher’s RPG Omega Labyrinth Z, which claimed the No.3 spot on Vita and No.5 on PS4, selling a combined total of 20,000 copies. Again, this is down on November 2015’s original Omega Labyrinth launch, where the title managed 25,000 Week One sales.

Here’s the Top Ten in full for the week ending July 9th:

1. Gundam Versus (PS4), Bandai Namco Entertainment, 121,278 (New)
2. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (Switch), Nintendo, 11,592
3. Omega Labyrinth Z (Vita), D3 Publisher, 10,918 (New)
4. ARMS (Switch), Nintendo, 10,246
5. Omega Labyrinth Z (PS4), D3 Publisher, 9,449 (New)
6. Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology (3DS), Atlus, 5,306
7. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Switch), Nintendo, 5,061
8. Farpoint (PS4), Sony, 3,847
9. Portal Knights (PS4), Spike Chunsoft, 3,807
10. Monster Hunter XX (3DS), Capcom, 3,610

And here’s the hardware chart for the same period:

1. Nintendo Switch, 36,143
2. PS4, 21,506
3. New Nintendo 3DS XL, 8,891
4. PS4 Pro, 6,908
5. PS Vita, 4,678
6. Nintendo 2DS, 2,019
7. New Nintendo 3DS, 228
8. Wii U, 176
9. PS3, 96
10. Xbox One S, 68