Japanese game industry sales up year-over-year thanks to Pokemon, 3DS

The Japanese games market grew for the first time in two years during the first half of 2012, thanks to 3DS, according to figures released by Enterbrain and Famitsu.

Domestic industry sales totals for the period covering December 26 through June 24, otal hardware and software sales reached ¥193.4 billion compared to ¥191.98 billion year-over-year which is a 0.7% increase.

Hardware sales reported a loss with ¥70.73 billion reported compared to ¥79.81 billion the previous year; however, software made up the difference with ¥122.67 billion in sales, compared to ¥112.17 billion in 2011. A 9.4% increase.

3DS was the top selling system, and moved 2.22 million units, while PS3 and PSP came in second and third, respectively.

Here's the Japanese hardware for the period. Life-to-date sales are in parentheses:

1. Nintendo 3DS: 2,219,548 (total 6,355,287)
2. PlayStation 3: 695,465 (total 8,112,613)
3. PlayStation Portable: 500,333 (total 18,737,441)
4. PlayStation Vita: 353,657 (total 756,451)
5. Nintendo Wii: 265,578 (total 12,433,321)
6. Xbox 360: 33,809 (total 1,554,547)
7. Nintendo DS: 20,239 (total 32,855,741)

Here's the software chart for the period with release date in parenthesis:

1. Pokémon Black & White 2 (DS, Pokémon, 23rd June 2012): 1,618,621
2. One Piece Pirate Warriors (PS3, Namco Bandai, 1st March 2012 2012): 806,578
3. Dragon Quest Monsters Terry's Wonderland 3D (3DS, Square Enix, 31st March 2012): 743,967
4. Mario Kart 7 (3DS, Nintendo, 1st December 2011): 665,573 (total 1,747,964)
5. Monster Hunter 3 G (3DS, Capcom, 10th December 2011): 665,394 (1,474,716)

Thanks, Andriasang.