Sales for the week ending June 5th point to one definite: the Japanese are sure loving that DS...

Courtesy of Media-Create, we have the most recent sales figures from Japan. (Note: thanks to C-E reader Kevin for pointing out an error with last week's hardware charts.) What last week's situation largely boils down to is this: the consistently downward trend of weekly-monthly game sales in Japan thus far these past few months have been very disconcerting. Last week again saw total sales numbers dip to 343,793 units, a roughly 50% decrease from last week. The falling numbers are attributed mostly to a dearth of compelling new releases...luckily for Nintendo fans, the DS is pulling its own weight in the market however.

DS "non-game", DS Training For Adults: Work Your Brain took the lead spot this week, now amassing an impressive 3-week total of over 100,000. Additionally, the DS prescence was bolstered by sales of SD Gundam G Generation, the return of the adorable Nintendogs, and the debut of a new Pachinko title from Sega that borrows from the Fist of the North Star manga license. In all, the DS claimed four slots in the top 10, and 8 in the top 20.

Meanwhile, Gamecube's Metroid Prime 2: Dark Echoes slipped to 16th while EA's NBA Street title fell to 20th. Finally, yes, that is indeed a PSP game you see in the Top 10...figures it took an RPG to finally do it. Otherwise, the PS2 largely had its usual healthy showing.

In the hardware race, DS again reigned at the top accounting for over 34% of last week's hardware sales. It was followed by the same lineup pattern of previous weeks: strong PS2 sales, good PSP sales and healthy GBA SP sales.