This Week In Sales: Debuts For The Liar Princess and Blind Prince, BlazBlue: Cross Tag Bomba

Period: The week of May 28 – June 3 (2018)

Top-seller: Dark Souls: Remastered – 19,870 (PlayStation 4)

Nintendo Switch sales: 40,587 (Last week – 36,590)

Nintendo 2DS sales: 337 (384)

New Nintendo 2DS LL sales: 3,838 (3,524)

New Nintendo 3DS LL sales: 2,653 (2,686)

PlayStation 4 sales: 13,025 (12,595)

PlayStation 4 Pro sales: 5,146 (4,887)

PlayStation Vita sales: 2,393 (2,298)

Xbox One sales: 73 (89)

Xbox One X sales: 62 (74)

<< Last week’s software sales chart

<< How to read and understand sale

Last week, Japan saw the release of BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle, The Liar Princess and Blind Prince, Full Metal Panic! Fight! Who Dares Wins, Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth 1 Plus, and Shantae: Half-Genie Hero Ultimate Edition on Switch. Japanese sales tracker Media Create released the latest video game software and hardware sales data from the week of May 28 through June 3, 2018.

The #1 of the week goes to Dark Souls: Remastered for the second week straight with 19,870 units sold on PS4. Detroit: Become Human has also charted at #2 again with 16,932 units sold on PS4. Splatoon 2 jumped up to #3 this week with 14,317 units sold on the Switch.

The first new title of the week in the chart goes to BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle which charted at #4 on PS4 with 11,696 units. The game also charted at #17 with 4,271 units sold on Switch. Together combined that’s 15,967 units between the two, a pretty big drop for BlazBlue. It’s a spinoff so lower numbers are expected, but the franchise has been trending downwards since BlazBlue: Central Fiction sold 30,282 units in its debut, which was already considered a pretty weak launch.

Here’s a look at how the other BlazBlue titles have performed in their debuts:

• (2009) Calamity Trigger – 58,580 (PS3- 33,768 |X360 – 24,812)
• (2010) Continuum Shift – 49,871 (PS3)
• (2011) Continuum Shift Extend – 37,758 (PS3 – 32,992 |X360 –  4,766)
• (2013) Chrono Phantasma – 72,464 (PS3)
• (2015) Chrono Phantasma Extend – 23,139 (PS4 – 7,589 |PS3 – 15,550)
• (2016) Central Fiction – 30,282 (PS4 – 20,608 |PS3 – 9,674)

Other than it being a spinoff title, one of the main attractions for the game is the addition of RWBY, which isn’t exactly a well-established franchise in Japan, so it’s understandable why it didn’t help the game sell a few more thousands as we can expect to see from it in the West. Additionally, keep in mind that fans of the other series in BlazBlue, Under Night In-Birth, and Persona 4 Arena are fans of more technical fighters and that’s something BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle certainly isn’t in comparison. It’s also safe to assume that the fact that half the roster is locked under DLC could very well be another reason that may have turned off fans or at least put some in a wait-and-see approach.

The next new title is Full Metal Panic! Fight! Who Dares Wins at #7 with 10,520 units sold on PS4. Following is The Liar Princess and Blind Prince which charted at #10 on PS4 with 6,476 units, #11 on Switch with 6,412 units, and #15 on PS Vita with 4,519 units sold for a combined total of 17,418 units. This tops Nippon Ichi’s previous title, Yomawari: Midnight Shadows, which was made in a similar fashion and sold 16,321 units between PS4 and PS Vita last August.

At #15 we have Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth 1 Plus with 4,367 units sold on PS4, which is definitely on the lower side, but nothing unexpected for a game that has already released in several versions. Lastly, at #19 we have Shantae: Half-Genie Hero Ultimate Edition with 3,303 units sold on Switch.

We also have a milestone worth mentioning with a big congratulations going to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild which sold 6,722 units on Nintendo Switch to make it a million-seller via retail in Japan with 1,004,689 units sold in stores as of June 3, 2018.

Hardware sales didn’t see much change as the PS4 sold 13,025 units and the PS4 Pro sold 5,146 to combine for 18,171 units between the two. The Nintendo Switch was the best-selling hardware with 40,587 units, a bit of a jump from last week’s 36,590. Going by Media Create’s numbers, the Nintendo Switch is currently at 4,305,715units sold in Japan since its launch in March 3, 2017.

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

Sales data acquired from 4Gamer and Media Create.