Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer Dominates Japanese Charts, Boosts 3DS Sales

um... wow... that was unexpected though at the same time, it is kind of the thing Japanese gamers seem to flock to.

It is also good to see the Wii U increase for two weeks in a row.

And there goes any argument anyone has about Japanese gamers having any taste. We were all pleased with FE's strong debut a few weeks ago, but in two days this Animal Crossing spin-off has probably sold more than FE: If ever will in Japan. It's definitely sold more than Xenoblade Chronicles X ever will over there.

Oh well, at least Splatoon is sure to hit 500k next week

Congratulations, Animal Crossing and Nintendo

Happy Home Designer is barely lower than AC4's debut, a main series entry and first on the 3DS. That's insane for a spin-off. Also a healthy bump for 3DS, probably people upgrading to the LL model for built in NFC.

And Splatoon just refuses to quit. It's outpacing Mario Kart 8 and should get a big boost in coming weeks due to Obon. It might even hit a million this year in Japan, depending on how the holidays look.

Wii U and PS4 still up year over year, which everyone should be happy about.

Splatoon staying this strong for so long makes me think that it's going to stay in the top 5 for the remainder of the year, unless a bunch of new games put it in the top 10.

Edit: The PS4 outsells the Wii U quite regularly but there's only two low selling PS4 games on there. Strange...

Everyone on the planet and their pet could buy this game and it wouldn't affect what I do.

I wish Fire Emblem If would sell better, but I think that sales in the West will be stronger.

@CaviarMeths I've seen spin-offs that sell just as big as this....like the Wario Land series? Or what about Mario Kart? or how about Hyrule Warriors?

Its so depressing to see that FE can't sell huge than Home designer. I want FE to reach 2 million.....can it so that Nintendo can make more FE games in future?

Those N3DS and HHD numbers, though! XD
Who knows... maybe Amiibo Festival could also cause a freak spike in Wii U numbers...

Wow, didn't expect that. Another 3DS hit. And Splatoon is still up there. Nice job, Nintendo.

Good to see the numbers remaining strong in Japan. Too bad the Wii U just hasnt hit a stride in the west. It really should be up over 100K a month in US. Too much "It's a dead console" talk I guess.

I'm surprised we aren't seeing more exclusive Japan Wii U titles at this point. Its Japanese base seems relatively healthy and I would think 1 of the Japanese publishers would be trying to take advantage of it.

I actually expected this game to sell well; it always looked really fun.

@Artwark Try not to pull any muscles scraping the bottom of the barrel for less valid examples than Wario Land, Mario Kart, and Hyrule Warriors.

@Gerbwmu It's really not doing well in Japan at all. I don't know why people have settled on this '10k a week is good' thing, because it's not. Those numbers do NOT give you a user base that's profitable to release games on. It's under 2.5 million lifetime sales in Japan, so even a big hit that sells to 10% of the audience would struggle to make money back, unless it was a very cheap game. Publishers have to look at the worldwide market as a whole and make their calls based on that.

Wow, they know their market. I'd be even more surprised if it did this well in NA/EU.

Nice to see Rhythm Heaven and Splatoon still holding there.

I have no issues with Home Designer being so high.

@Aromaiden
I didn't quite expect sales this high, but I agree. It's a way to enjoy a particular aspect of the game that is fun but usually very restricted. It's like wish fulfillment. Plus, for kids there are the collectible and tradable cards. I think they missed an opportunity at some challenge and AI judgement as an option for gamers, but maybe the social aspect of sharing creations will fill that void just fine for avid 3DS owners — yeah, that last sentence sounds like the review on this site but I really agreed with it!

Don't think it will do as well in the West, but fans are fans.

I'm waiting to find out about that Wii U AC Amiibo festival game. Don't quite get that one yet. It has the charm, but it seems to be so void of anything fun to do for anyone past preschool. There must be more to it... or it's free... or it's really just a hub for all your amiibo cards and AC figurines to do silly stuff and play around.

@Yorumi There's plenty of opportunities to add new things to do in AC besides it though. And maybe aspects of this game will be included. Either way, Nintendo got to sell a game that people are excited about. Not really seeing a problem here.

@Peach64 Japanese gamers and taste? Do you have American or European friends that play mobile 'games' like Kim Kardashian: Hollywood?? Next to dreck like that, yes, the Japanese have stupendous taste.

@Peach64 - relatively speaking on my part. Still the highest current gen base in Japan. I'm not expecting huge franchise japan only game just surprised we haven't seen a few more retail releases from that side of the ocean as of late.

Could be a ton of eShop releases though that I dont know about. I know the VC is much healthier in Japan then the west.

Animal Crossing is killing it, even the old game is still on chart. I thought AC:HHD is a bad idea, but Nintendo clearly know their market better than anyone. Congrats Animal Crossing! Now it will be interesting to see how Amiibo Festival will do, though we might never know as it's a free to play game.

Splatoon is still strong, wonder if next week will see a boost with the big update. Wii U looks to have a >10k baseline now, which is a good thing.

Hope Fire Emblem could stay on the chart for a long time too.

Yoshii's Wooly World has sold a pitiful 50,000 copies in Japan. Hey Nintendo, thanks for spending 20 minutes during the direct on that game. It clearly made a difference! I'm very worried for that game. Cuteness wins over in Japan much more than elsewhere. That game may end up like DKTF, great platformer but zero sales.

On the Animal Crossing groups I visit, nearly everyone has 600 hours, 1,000 hours, 2,000 hours. I've seen people with two 1,500 hour files.

That's ten times more than it took me to tun through Skyrim twice... and Fallout 3...and Oblivion.......
Animal Crossing fans can be cray-cray.

@Hero-of-WiiU Yeah, PS4 seems to consistently outsell its own games. I don't know why.

@Peach64 Respectfully, it's quite arrogant to expect everyone to have the same tastes as you. Why not celebrate the game's success, rather than criticizing? Why turn positive news into negative?

@aaronsullivan If there's a hub in amiibo Festival wouldn't that make it just another AC game? That's all I see when I look at any AC game, a big hub world w/ very little game in it. Though this seems to have a purpose, designing homes, but I'm not exactly sure what else is going on in HHD, I'm pretty sure I'm not it's audience.

It's very surprising to see Happy Home Designer get that many sales. I guess Japan has different tastes in games than over here.

Jeez, that's a lot more than I thought it'd get.
Also on a non-Nintendo matter, nice to see IA/VT Colorful doing over 30k.

I think HHD's sales say more about how strong AC is there rather than just taste. Looking at the legs New Leaf has had and how much it's sold, I wouldn't be shocked at all if a new main AC entry cleared a million first week.

Splatoon still got legs for days (or in this case, months). They should do a 3DS version just to see how much milk this cow can produce.

For comparison's sake, Animal Crossing New Leaf launched with 603,064 copies sold in Japan. Happy Home Designer, a mere spin-off, sold just 80,508 copies less than New Lead did during their respective launches. Definitely very impressive numbers.

As for hardware, 3DS sales went up by a sizable amount thanks to the Happy Home Designer bundles. Everything else remained flat compared to last week.

Also, does anyone know how well the amiibo cards sold??

i'm looking forward to hhd, and given the enthusiasm of the ac community, i'm not really surprised it has done well so far.

@LoveSugoi i would love to see splatoon on 3ds.

And people complain about animal crossing being on 3DS rather then Wii U.

Animal crossing needs to stay portable. That is where the market is. Wii U still a dead console!!

Well there goes any respect I had for Japanese gamers! shudders

Loving this so far! I've got all the villagers unlocked, just doing a ton of decorating now

@CaviarMeths Well.......there's Donkey Kong and Kirby acting as spin-offs.

oh and how about Yoshi's Island?

@TG1 Isn't that always the case?

I didn't like Kid Icarus a lot but I'm glad that others like it. I love 3D Land and yet, people mock at it being the worst Mario game ever made.

@Nintendofan83 DKC:TF has sold around a million or so life-to-date.

You may want to point to the Kirby game.

@Peach64 We can cheat and count all routes as a sale apiece!

I'm glad Happy Home Designer is doing so well. I wasn't sure about this game when it was announced, but seeing more of the game made me want to play it. Good thing it's not that long of a wait until the North American release.

I did my part and bought the Fire Emblem games. And my copy of Animal Crossing was from the same week sales went over 4 million, so that's cool. This Rhythm Heaven game, though, is magnificent - my favourite in the series so far.

I'm an AC addict so I hope they'll exploit the F out of this title if that means we'll get new stuff every few months/years..

@Nintendofan83 To be fair, it'll probably do a lot better in the US, where E3 focuses on.

@Ichiban Yes, how dare they enjoy a genre of game that I don't??