Japan Charts: Banpresto's latest anime title on top as sales pick up

Software sales in Japan have picked up significantly this week after hitting their lowest ebb in around three and a half years, with Banpresto's PS2 title Yu Yu Hakusho Forever coming in at number one as the market rebounded.

Based on the popular anime and manga series Yu Yu Hakusho, the new beat 'em up title is the latest addition to Banpresto's extensive range of games licensed off well-known Japanese kids properties, and picked up around 79,000 unit sales in its first weekend.

It was followed in the chart by Nintendo's new DS title, DS Training for Adults: Work Your Brain - which isn't a game in the traditional sense, but rather a set of mental workouts using the touch screen and microphone, and developed in cooperation with Touhoku University.

Coming hot on the heels of another "not-a-game", the immensely successful Nintendogs, DS Training for Adults has sold around 43,000 units in its first weekend, and helped to keep the DS as the most successful console in Japan in terms of hardware sales for yet another week.

Further down the ranking, there are new entries for Capcom's Vampire Darkstalkers Collection (PS2) at number four, Hudson's Bomberman on the Nintendo DS at number six, and Nintendo's DK: King of Swing (GBA) at number seven.

Nintendogs is also still in the top ten, with two of the four versions that were released simultaneously last month in the ranking - Shiba and Friends at number five, and Dachs and Friends and number ten.

In hardware terms, as mentioned above, the Nintendo DS is on top of the market once more - taking over 32 per cent market share this week, compared to just 26 per cent share for the PlayStation Portable, while the PlayStation 2 has just under 30 per cent share.

Picking up the scraps of the market are the Game Boy Advance with just under 9 per cent share, the Cube with around 2.6 per cent, and the Xbox with 0.27 per cent this week.