Microsoft continues Japanese 360 push in face of poor sales

Microsoft has once again assembled an impressive collection of Japanese gaming luminaries to continue its push of the Xbox 360 in Japan.

Ahead of next week's Tokyo Game Show, the company rolled out Team Ninja's Tomonobu Itagaki, Mistwalkers' Hironobu Sakaguchi and representatives from Square Enix at a recent press event to announce format exclusives, brand new titles and release dates for high-profile games.

Team Ninja is developing Ninja Gaiden 2 exclusively for the Xbox 360, while Square Enix has unveiled two new titles — Infinite Undiscovery and The Last Remnant. Developer Mistwalker finally announced the much-hyped Lost odyssey will arrive in Japan this December with a US and Euro release in February.

The Xbox 360 has suffered from poor sales in the region, with the local charts dominated by Nintendo DS and Wii software, as well as titles for the PlayStation 2.

The latest sales data from Media Create shows that the Xbox 360 has sold 406,060 units since its release in December 2005. In contrast, the Nintendo Wii has sold over 3.5 million units since its launch a year later and Sony's PlayStation 3 has shifted over 1.1 million following a November 2006 launch.

As well as boxed games, Microsoft is also lining up a number of Xbox Live Arcade titles from some of Japan's best-loved development studios.

Dreamcast fan favourite's Rez from Q Entertainment and Treasure's 2D shooter Ikaruga will both make the jump to the download service, while Hudson Entertainment will be contributing new IP Omega Five. Warashi is also adding it's arcade shooter Triggerheart Exelica to the line-up.

As well as Japanese developed games, a number of titles from Western developers are also due for release before the end of the year, including Battlefield: Bad Company and Just Cause from Electronic Arts, Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed, Viva Pinata: Party Animals from Krome and Eidos' Battlestations: Midway.