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Posted:
04-03-2007, 01:28 PM
 Welcome back to the weekly update on the UK chart scene, which started off with last week’s overview of just how the PlayStation 3 managed to do in its first weekend on sale over in the UK. With so much stock available on the shelves around the country, though, the real test will be in these next few weeks as we attempt to determine whether Sony has the strength to retake the market it has previously had so much success in, or if things will quickly start to fade away.
First things first, Sony has been toppled from the number one spot on the Top 40 All Format listing by none other than Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars. According to Chart Track, this is a landmark occasion as the very first Command & Conquer launched on the PC eleven and a half years ago during the exact same week Sony’s now legendary PlayStation made its début (week 39 of 1995). It seems like the power of the PC strategy series has not yet lost its verve as it barges straight past Resistance: Fall of Man (now No.2) and MotorStorm (down to No.3) in its first weekend on sale. Despite holding on to those second and third positions, though, there is some worrying news in how much both games dropped off by in terms of sales compared to last week. Resistance: Fall of Man drops a mighty 66%, whilst MotorStorm’s performance sees it sell 62% less than its opening week.
Looking at the rest of the Top 10, the non-PS3 Brian Lara International Cricket 2007 is boosted by the PS2 version this week, but still has to make do with dropping a spot to No.4 and the same goes of Virtua Tennis 3. Sega’s popular tennis game saw a release on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 last week, but now has PlayStation Portable and PC editions added to its sales…and yet still slides one to No.5, whereas the release of the movie TMNT: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (also featured on the PlayStation 3, but not in its platform specific chart) has seen a tremendous boost in its game tie-in’s performance in its second week, jumping twelve from No.18 to No.6, just keeping its head above another late starter – UEFA Champions League 2006 – 2007, which is up six to No.7. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07 holds steady at No.8 thanks to constant promotional work from the reliably persistent Electronic Arts, whilst Call of Duty 3 falls four to No.9 in the face of another EA game – Medal of Honour: Vanguard (on both PlayStation 2 and Nintendo’s Wii), entering new at No.10.
Def Jam: Icon also benefits from solid retail presence, holding on for another week at No.11 and Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Advance Warfighter 2 drops three, despite launching on the PlayStation 3 last Friday. EA sees its Need for Speed: Carbon bounce back up three to No.13, with Xbox 360’s Crackdown scrambling back up four places to No.15, yet just below it at No.16 is the number four PlayStation 3 game of the week – Formula 1: Championship Edition, which falls a surprising ten places very quickly. Further down we see Fight Night Round 3 move back down three to No.17, Final Fantasy XII on the PlayStation 2 fail to jump back up, instead slipping a further four to No.21, yet Gears of War on Xbox 360 rebounds from No.31 to No.22. Could gamers really be heading back to Microsoft’s system already after just one week of Sony’s behemoth entering the UK market? The current situation looks like although the 360 was hit hard in the face of the PlayStation 3’s launch, it is countering pretty well just over seven days later.
Anyway, rounding things off, and showing a somewhat shocking revelation, we find that Namco Bandai’s Ridge Racer 7 has plummeted from No.10 all the way down to No.25, despite being seen to be one of the premier launch games and already becoming one of the strongest selling games on the Japanese PlayStation 3. On the other hand, last week’s terribly low entry for EA and Criterion’s Burnout Dominator is completely turned around as the game picks up speed to shoot from No.37 to No.28, leaving the PS3’s Virtua Fighter 5 from Sega in its trail of dust. The highly rated fighting game continues its worldwide poor performance, this time dropping a whopping eighteen spots to land at No.30. Finishing off out look at the Full Price All Format Top 40, the Wii’s Sonic and the Secret Rings may have fallen six to No.34, but skips ahead of Sonic the Hedgehog on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, as Sega’s reportedly inferior game nose dives down from No.22 to No.35.
So far it certainly looks like a replica of the PlayStation Portable launch back in September 2005, with the initial blitz of the Top 40, followed by a quick slide away of most titles. The main difference this time round has to be the fact that the system’s top two games are hanging around the top three, despite the heavy percentage decreases in their overall sales. It is worrying, however, to see that the next two system exclusives, Formula 1: Championship Edition and Ridge Racer 7, are faring far less spectacularly, with the Sony F1 game at No.4 on the PlayStation 3 chart, yet languishing at No.16 and Namco’s once extremely popular arcade racer at No.6, but only just hanging on at No.25 on the Top 40. As for how the rest of the PlayStation 3 chart looks, here is how they line up:
1.) Resistance: Fall of Man (Sony, Non Mover)
2.) MotorStorm (Sony, Non Mover)
3.) Call of Duty 3 (Activion, Up One)
4.) Formula 1: Championship Edition (Sony, Down One)
5.) Virtua Tennis 3 (Sega, Up One)
6.) Ridger Racer 7 (Namco Bandai, Down One)
7.) Fight Night Round 3 (Electronic Arts, Up Two)
8.) Virtua Fighter 5 (Sega, Down One)
9.) Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07 (Electronic Arts, Up Two)
10.) Def Jam: Icon (Electronic Arts, Up Two)
11.) Sonic the Hedgehog (Sega, Down One)
12.) Genji: Days of the Blade (Sony, Down Four)
13.) Need for Speed: Carbon (Electronic Arts, Non Mover)
14.) Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Double Agent (Ubisoft, New Entry)
15.) Tony Hawk’s Project 8 (Activision, Non Mover)
16.) Marvel Ultimate Alliance (Activision, Down Two)
17.) Blazing Angels: Squadrons of World War II (Ubisoft, Up One)
18.) Full Auto 2: Battlelines (Sega, Down Two)
19.) NBA Street: Homecourt (Electronic Arts, Down Two)
20.) World Snooker Championship (Sega, Down One)
21.) Enchanted Arms (Ubisoft, Down One)
22.) NHL 2K7 (Take Two Interactive, Non Mover)
23.) Mobile Suit Gundam: Target in Sight (Namco Bandai, Down Two)
24.) The Godfather: The Don’s Edition (Electronic Arts, New Entry)
Surprisingly, EA’s special PlayStation 3 edition of The Godfather was only able to enter at No.24 this week, although Ubisoft’s new entry of Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell Double Agent hardly fares much better, coming in at No.14. It is also disappointing to see Enchanted Arms falling so swiftly as well, now residing at No.21. Although there is a lot of stock in stores long after the console’s release (for example a large WH Smith in Manchester has had big signs in the main window stating ‘Only Two Left!’ for the past week and a half…), it seems the major buyers were those simply waiting for the system to hit. Others are clearly biding their time, waiting to be convinced of the price tag, whilst other sectors are seemingly waiting for more of their favourite games to hit the streets.
Whatever the case, the Wii also had a very poor week and it was not like the Xbox 360 blew back into the chart with any real strong presence, so the PlayStation 3 is definitely in a very strong position right now. But how will things eventually turn out? Join us again in a week’s time to see how it fares in the next UK Chart Analysis article…
Article by Adam Riley
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PS3Chat Members
Posts: 21
Join Date: Feb 2007
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04-03-2007, 01:49 PM
Sadly, shortly after completing this article it was revealed that in terms of hardware, the PS3 fell by a whopping 82% since the previous weekend, meaning it dropped to around 33,000 units sold for the whole of last week!
165,000 down to 33,000...ouch - no wonder most of the games dropped quite sharply.
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PS3Chat Members
Posts: 89
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: Arkansas, USA
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04-05-2007, 10:13 AM
Well, you have to understand the reasons why the figures are dropping. You have to take into account that the first wave of buyers is usually the largest, and 33,000 is still a big number. Also, there may be shortages in some areas, or people just don't have the money yet. There is also the possibility they are waiting for a price drop or are not even interested.
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Banned
Posts: 1,825
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: England
PSN ID: ScootaKuH
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04-05-2007, 01:48 PM
Yup as hworang says 33,000 is a good number. It's just beyond even the most ardent PS fan's expectations for it to achieve a similar number the second week into its launch. It's a pity there are no figures from the second weeks of 360 and Wii. This means we have nothing to compare it to. The reasons for this is that both 360 and Wii suffered huge stock shortages and therefore will have sold virtually nothing. By comparison 33,000 is rather good. It's a typical catch 22 situation. Had the PS3 sold out and people couldn't get hold of one then Sony would have been criticised for not meeting consumer demand, but since the PS3 has had the biggest launch in UK history and STILL has stock it's deemed that the PS3 is a flop and people are not interested. It seems that whatever happens the PS3 is being willed to fail. I'm not a fanboy but I don't see why people are itching Sony to go down. Can't we all just live together happily?
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Banned
Posts: 2,060
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: England
PSN ID: teh_nayl
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04-07-2007, 10:02 AM
figures mean jack... i have a PS3 and I'm happy with it. Thats all that counts.
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