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UK Charts: Crash Bandicoot is the biggest single-format release of the year

Micro Machines at No.2. What year is it?

Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy has narrowly beaten Horizon: Zero Dawn to become the UK's biggest single-format boxed release of the year.

In fact, the only game to have enjoyed a bigger Week One was Ubisoft's Ghost Recon: Wildlands, which was released across multiple platforms.

The popularity of Activision's remake follows similar success for Wipeout: Omega Collection, which also topped the charts last month. Like Wipeout, this is the first time Crash Bandicoot has been at the top of the UK physical retail charts.

Crash is now the 24th best-selling video game franchise at UK boxed retail, according to GfK.

It's all part of the wave of nostalgia that appears to be boosting sales of retro games at the moment. Last week, the initial SNES Mini pre-order allocation was sold out in minutes, despite a significant increase in stock compared with last year's NES Mini.

In fact, this week's chart could easily have come out of the 1990s. The No.2 game is Codemasters' Micro Machines: World Series, which is a franchise that first debuted in 1991. A little further down and Sold Out has delivered Frontier's Elite Dangerous to retail. Elite was the first game to ever top a UK games chart - the Gallup chart from 1985.

Even for non-new releases, it's been a good week. GTA V boxed sales are up 12%, despite the game falling to No.3. Forza Horizon 3 has shot back into the Top Five at No.4 following a 70% rise, while FIFA 17 falls to No.5 but with a 40% increase in sales week-on-week.

Elsewhere, The Golf Club 2 by Maximum Games gets to No.27, while the standalone release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered, quietly released by Activision, debuts at No.32.

Valkyria Revolution rounds off the new releases at No.34.

Overall, UK boxed game sales are up 93% week-on-week to 331,000 games sold.

Here is the weekly UKIE/GfK UK Top Ten:

Last Week This Week Title
New Entry 1 Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy
New Entry 2 Micro Machines: World Series
1 3 Grand Theft Auto V
9 4 Forza Horizon 3
3 5 FIFA 17
6 6 Overwatch
New Entry 7 Elite Dangerous
5 8 Mario Kart 8: Deluxe
2 9 Dirt 4
11 10 Rocket League
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Christopher Dring avatar

Christopher Dring

Head of Games B2B

Chris is a 17-year media veteran specialising in the business of video games. And, erm, Doctor Who