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Professor Layton spin-off fails to reignite Japanese chart

Japanese sales still in slump despite top three success for Mass Effect

A new Nintendo DS title from Professor Layton makers Level-5 has entered straight in at number one in the weekly Japanese software charts, although sales across the board remain depressed.

As the top-selling game of the week Sloan to Michael: Nazo no Monogatari (roughly Sloan and Michael's Mysterious Story) sold just 44,000 units.

Also new at number two is Sega's Pro Yakyuu Team o Tsukurou! 2 (roughly Let's Make a Pro Baseball Team! 2) for the DS, which sold an equally underwhelming 39,000 units.

The final new entry of the week, at number three, was BioWare's Mass Effect on Xbox 360. Although it is unusual to see a Western role-playing game so high in the Japanese charts the meagre sales of 18,000 units would rarely have been enough to enter the top ten in previous months.

The rest of the top 10 sees the usual suspects simply tread water, with the budget priced re-release of Monster Hunter Portable 2 G (aka Monster Hunter Freedom Unit) rising two places to number four and last week's number one, Bleach: Heat the Soul 6 down at number five. Once again the bottom ranked title sold less than 10,000 units.

  • 01 Sloan and Michael's Mysterious Story (DS)
  • 02 Let's Make a Pro Baseball Team! 2 (DS)
  • 03 Mass Effect (360)
  • 04 Monster Hunter Freedom Unite (PSP)
  • 05 Bleach: Heat the Soul 6 (PSP)
  • 06 Dragon Ball Kai (DS)
  • 07 Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of the Sky (DS)
  • 08 WarioWare Myself! (DS)
  • 09 Wii Fit (Wii)
  • 10 Mario & Luigi RPG 3!!! (DS)