If last week was considered impressive, take a peek at DS sales for the week ending December 11th...

Courtesy of Media-Create, we have the most recent sales figures from Japan.

December continued to show a strong surge in consumer interest, and apparently a certain dual-screened portable was the hot item. Nearly 300k DS units found their way into the hands of eager gamers and non-gamers alike while DS software sales almost across the board enjoyed a notable boost as a result. This gargantuan figure easily allowed the DS to outsell all other platforms combined for the third straight week, and represented the third largest single week figure since the handheld's launch last year.

Perhaps it shouldn't be so shocking. Just as in the West, the release of Mario Kart DS proved to be the breaking point on the wills of many gamers trying to resist the increasing allure of the DS library, while Animal Crossing itself continued to draw tremendous interest. Not even the XBOX 360 launch could dampen enthusiasm (quite the reverse actually.)

Other Nintendo systems saw a healthy increase in sales as well with the Gamecube returning to 12k levels. Notably, the GBA SP outsold its slimmer, sexier cousin for the first time since the Micro's launch...the beginning of a trend? One thing is for sure...the DS continues to cement itself as this year's darling in the Japanese video game market.

The week's console numbers:

Software numbers to follow...(preview: Mario Kart DS did pretty well.)