Japan Charts: DS software still on top despite hardware shortages

Nintendo's DS continues to hold the lion's share of the top ten in Japan's software charts this week, with seven titles for the hugely popular handheld in the ranking - but hardware supply shortages are still stunting sales of the console itself.

With the incredibly busy New Years sales period drawing to a close - this week's sales were less than half as strong as last week's - the latest Brain Training title, More DS Training for Adults: Work Your Brain, is still at number one.

It is followed in the ranking by last year's best-selling game in Japan, Animal Crossing: Wild World, whild the original DS Training for Adults: Work Your Brain is at number three in the chart, and Mario Kart DS is at number four.

Three more DS titles - namely Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time, Gentle Brain Exercises, and Bandai's Tamagotchi Connection - occupy positions eight, nine and ten respectively in this week's chart.

There's only one new release in the ranking, Sony Computer Entertainment's anime-based mech-strategy-cum-dating PS2 game, Gunparade Orchestra: White Chapter, which sold around 36,000 units to come in at number five this week.

Rounding out the top ten are one more PS2 title - Square Enix' hugely successful Kingdom Hearts II, enjoying yet another week in the charts with a number seven placing - and a single PSP title, Capcom's Monster Hunster Portable, at number six.

However, in hardware terms, the PSP was the best-selling console of the week in Japan for a second consecutive week, selling almost 58,000 to the DS' 54,000 unit sales, a reflection of Nintendo's ongoing stock problems with the DS.

In the first two weeks of this year the PSP has sold over 190,000 units, compared to just shy of 146,000 for the DS - a massive decline for the persistently out-of-stock DS, which sold around 1.3 million units in the last three weeks of December alone.

Nintendo has made no comment on the stock situation since apologising to retailers and consumers almost two weeks ago, but told GamesIndustry.biz last week that claims that the low levels of stock are partially due to plans to introduce a redesigned DS console in the coming weeks were "pure speculation."