Final Fantasy XV is the second fastest selling game in franchise history in the UK

Square Unix's Final Fantasy XV has got off to a strong start at UK games retail.

Digital data isn't included, but in terms of boxes, it is the second-fastest selling game in the series' history - beaten only by 2010's Final Fantasy XIII. If you combine the early performance of this with the new Skyrim remake (which has been one of this Christmas' more successful launches) and it's been a strong quarter for the RPG genre.

Skyrim actually saw its sales rise last week by 34 percent, driven by Cyber Monday discounting.

Square Enix's challenge will be to maintain Final Fantasy XV's early performance. The game has an avid hardcore fanbase, and typically titles of this type tend to do well in their debut week, but fall away quickly after that. As a means of comparison, unit sales of Final Fantasy XIII fell by 80 percent in its second week back in March 2010.

Despite the initial success of Final Fantasy, the game didn't quite manage No.1 - the seemingly unstoppable FIFA 17 continues to hold its position at the top of the charts. The game's sales dropped 42 percent after its successful Black Friday activity. EA will be pleased that the game has passed 2m in record time. To put that into context, no other UK game this year has passed 1m sales (yet).

Call of Duty, Battlefield and Forza continue to do well weeks (and even months) after they initially launched, further adding evidence to the notion that gamers are holding off when it comes to buying new titles. In fact, the best evidence of that is Watch Dogs 2, which after a disappointing initial launch, has enjoyed two strong weeks of sales and has now secured a very healthy install base in the UK.

Last week's stand-out successes, Pokemon Sun and Moon, have dropped in sales by 77 percent and 72 percent respectively. That may sound like a lot, but actually it is in-keeping with games that enjoy big first weeks - and those games were (combined) Nintendo's biggest UK launches ever.

Unfortunately, Ubisoft's new IP Steep has not had the strongest of starts - debuting at No.24. The game's reviews have yet to go live and it is being billed as a live multiplayer product, so its initial launch is perhaps not as important as other titles. GfK says it is the fourth fastest-selling winter sports title in history, which really isn't saying anything.

Meanwhile, Super Mario Maker is back in the Top 40 at No.25. The game returns following its arrival on 3DS. This version is significantly different to the Wii U version, so why they've been counted as a single game we're not sure.