This Week In Sales: Final Fantasy XV Takes Back The Throne

Period: The week of November 29th – December 4th (2016)

Top-seller: Final Fantasy XV – 690,471 (PS4)

Nintendo 3DS sales: 368

Nintendo 3DS LL sales: 92

Nintendo 2DS – 17,623

New Nintendo 3DS sales: 7,432

New Nintendo 3DS LL sales: 53,414

PlayStation Vita sales: 20,141

Wii U sales: 4,718

PlayStation 4 sales: 110,318

PlayStation 4 Pro: 8,032

PlayStation 3 sales: 704

Xbox One sales: 256

<< Last week’s software sales chart

<< How to read and understand sales

Last week, Japan and the rest of the world finally saw the release of Final Fantasy XV on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Also released in Japan was Watch Dogs 2, Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS, and more. Here’s the latest from Japanese sales tracker, Media Create, with a look at software and hardware sales data from the week of November 28 through December 4, 2016.

After hearing about how well Final Fantasy XV performed since it’s release, it comes as no surprise that Square Enix’s hit RPG placed #1 in Japan with 690,471 copies sold on PS4 along with an additional 3,791 on Xbox One (which is actually the first Xbox One title in the top-20 we’ve seen in ages!) to place #19 for a total of 694,262 copies sold in its debut to take the throne.

Final Fantasy XV may have impressively topped 5 million units in worldwide shipment in just a day to make it the fastest-selling title from the series, and it also broke the record for the most first-day digital sales in Japan, but it’s far from having the best sales debut in Japan.

Here’s a look at how it stacks against other titles from the series in first-week sales:

• (2001) Final Fantasy X – 1,400,00 (PS2)*
• (2006) Final Fantasy XII – 1,764,266 (PS2)
• (2009) Final Fantasy XIII – 1,501,964 (PS3)
• (2011) Final Fantasy XIII-2 – 524,217 (PS3)
• (2013) Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII – 277,082
• (2016) Final Fantasy XV – 694,262 (690,471 PS4|3,791 XOne)

*First-week sales for Final Fantasy X-2 not available from Media Create

The above chart provides us with a better idea on how the Final Fantasy series has sold in Japan over the years. [Thanks for the data and chart, Ishaan!]

We can gather from everything above that the Final Fantasy series has seen better days on console in Japan, but seeing how well it has performed around the world, I’m sure Square Enix is still satisfied with the results we’ve seen so far. Additionally, there are plenty of Final Fantasy smartphone games that have been performing fairly well in Japan, along with others such as Dragon Quest of the Stars that continue to make bank for the company.

Pokémon Sun & Moon continues with its strong performance with 223,051 copies sold in its second week, and has sold over 2,189,345 copies in Japan. Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS placed #3 and actually topped the original Wii U version’s debut of 138,242 copies. Meanwhile, Watch Dogs 2 slipped in Japan with 39,965 copies sold on its debut for PS4. For comparison, its predecessor sold 94,623 copies between PS4 and PS3 back in July 2014.

All Kamen Rider: Rider Revolution took #5 with 23,308 copies sold for 3DS in its debut, and Digimon Universe: Appli Monsters placed #11 with 7,255 copies sold for 3DS in its debut. Overall, we saw a pretty high boost in software sales, which likely has something to do with Japanese retail giants joining in on the Black Friday frenzy in late-November.

On the hardware front, we saw a huge boost in PlayStation 4 sales with 110,318 units sold, more than tripling its 33,859 units the week before. The New 3DS LL also saw some action going from 45,622 units the week before to 53,414 units. The PlayStation Vita saw a raise from 12,240 to 20,141 as well. The one thing that stands out is that most of the consoles sold more than the week prior, but the PlayStation 4 Pro actually sold a couple hundred fewer.

The top-20 chart for the week was as follows:

Sales data acquired from 4Gamer and Media Create.