Shin Sangoku Musou 5 (aka Dynasty Warriors 6) made its debut on Sunday, an odd choice since most games in Japan are released on Thursday. The sales numbers are out and if you add up the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions, Koei’s most recognizable series sold 210,000 copies. That puts Shin Sangoku Musou 5 barely behind Mario Party DS, which sold 235,000 copies. Since Mario had a few extra days on the market the sales data makes sense.
However, I’m not that interested in how well Shin Sangoku Musou 5 sold in comparison to other games. I wanted to see how it sold against itself. This is the first time Koei has released a Shin Sangoku Musou game simultaneously on a Playstation platform and a Microsoft console. So how did the 360 version fare? Terribly, with only 22,000 copies sold. The Playstation 3 release sold 188,000 copies, which translates to roughly 8.5 copies of the PS3 version for every one copy of the Xbox 360 version.
Is this more gloom and doom for the Xbox 360 in Japan? Not necessarily, but it does show Xbox 360 owners in Japan either a.) prefer the Playstation 3 version when a multiplatform release comes out or b.) they aren’t that interested in Shin Sangoku Musou 5. Perhaps, Xbox 360 owners in Japan are interested in the Western-oriented games the Xbox 360 has become a home for. Wouldn't that be an interesting turn of events?
