This Week In Sales: Monster Hunter Is Still King In Japan

Period: The week of January 22 – January 28 (2018)

Top-seller: Monster Hunter: World – 1,245,169 (PlayStation 4)

Nintendo Switch sales: 47,107 (Last week – 43,027)

Nintendo 2DS sales: 1,094 (1,250)

New Nintendo 2DS LL sales: 6,842 (7,302)

New Nintendo 3DS LL sales: 3,377 (3,563)

PlayStation 4 sales: 110,023 (37,572)

PlayStation 4 Pro sales: 30,122 (14,935)

PlayStation Vita sales: 3,744 (4,256)

Xbox One sales: 68 (103)

Xbox One X sales: 1,618 (1,285)

<< Last week’s software sales chart

<< How to read and understand sales

Last week, Japan had a big week with the release of Monster Hunter: World which launched globally on January 26, 2018. Japanese sales tracker Media Create released the latest software and hardware sales data from the week of January 15 through January 21, 2018.

The top-seller of the week is without a question Monster Hunter: World, which charted at #1 with 1,245,169 sold on PlayStation 4. This is a tremendous debut for any title these days, and it should be interesting to see if any other titles top it the rest of this year.

Here’s how the first-week figures of Monster Hunter: World compares to other entries from the series:

• [2004] Monster Hunter – 124,500 (PS2)
• [2005] Monster Hunter Freedom – 113,640 (PSP)
• [2006] Monster Hunter 2 – 362,173 (PS2)
• [2007] Monster Hunter Freedom 2 – 705,281 (PSP)
• [2008] Monster Hunter Freedom Unite – 880,468 (PSP)
• [2009] Monster Hunter Tri – 520,138 (Wii)
• [2010] Monster Hunter Portable 3rd – 1,950,717 (PSP)
• [2011] Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate – 521,959 (3DS)
• [2013] Monster Hunter 4 – 1,715,060 (3DS)
• [2014] Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate – 1,446,289 (3DS)
• [2015] Monster Hunter Generations – 1,448,367 (3DS)
• [2017] Monster Hunter XX – 848,467 (3DS)
• [2018] Monster Hunter: World – 1,245,169 (PS4)

Monster Hunter: World’s figures may not be as high as Monster Hunter 4, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate, and Monster Hunter Generations on 3DS, it managed to sell over 1.2 million to a smaller install base of the PS4 in Japan. Monster Hunter Portable 3rd almost hit 2 million in its debut back in 2010, and while it may seem impossible to surpass today, keep in mind that it happened when the series’ popularity was at a peak during the PSP’s prime.

Nonetheless, Monster Hunter: World’s debut is impressive and it should be interesting to see how it performs in the coming weeks. It’s also worth noting that console games tend to not sell as much longterm compared to handheld hits, so this will be a challenge for Capcom as well.

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle kept up at #2 with 26,088 units sold on Switch and following closely behind it is Splatoon 2 at #3 with 25,776 units sold. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and Super Mario Odyssey are also seeing continued sales, charting at #4 and #5 with 21,834 and 16,664 units sold respectively.

As far as other new titles go, the only other one was The Seven Deadly Sins: Knights of Britannia which debuted with 6,961 units sold on the PS4. It’s a bit on the lower end, but about expected for the series.

On the hardware side of things, the PS4 was the top-selling console after with 110,023 units sold thanks to a huge boost of sales from Monster Hunter: World. The Nintendo Switch continues strong sales with 47,101 units sold, which now puts it at 3,584,982 units sold in Japan since its launch in March 2017, according to Media Create’s trackers.

The top-20 chart of the week is as follows:

Sales data acquired from 4Gamer and Media Create.