Japan Charts: Namco's drumming sim tops the charts, but overall sales are slow

A small flurry of new releases this week didn't help to lift the Japanese software market out of the sales decline it's been experiencing for a few weeks, although Namco's new drumming title debuted strongly.

Taiko no Tatsujin: 3rd Generation topped the charts in its first week on sale, and is rapidly proving itself to be a very popular addition to the rhythm action genre in Japan - although there's still no sign of a western release for the game and its drum controller.

Elsewhere the charts was dominated largely by anime tie-in titles, with high ratings for Bandai's Naruto (PS2) and Macross (PS2) titles, as well as Kadokawa Shoten's Da Capo Plus Situation (PS2), which was originally a dating game but is now enjoying a major boost to its fortunes thanks to a popular TV series. Konami's latest Prince of Tennis title, Kiss of Prince, also sneaks into the top ten.

Nintendo's Made in Wario (GC) is at number two this week, and is the only title in the top ten to appear on a platform other than the PlayStation 2. Capcom's release of Grand Theft Auto III is still in the top ten, although sales are slowing considerably, and of course there's the inevitable Pachinko title - with this weeks being Tecmo's effort, Rakusho! Pachinko Slot Sengen.

In hardware terms, the PS2 is very close to catching the GameBoy Advance this week - it has 38.37 per cent market share, just a fraction behind the GBA with 38.67 per cent share. However, all of the consoles have experienced a sales decline over the past week, with the exception of the GameCube - which has been boosted by a price cut in the middle of last month and now holds 20.78 per cent market share.

The Xbox was behind the PSone again this week, with 0.71 per cent market share as against 0.77 per cent for Sony's venerable console. It will be interesting to watch whether the price cut expected towards the end of this month, along with the launch of Project Gotham Racing 2 and a special bundle pack, can lift sales of the console for any period of time.

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