November 13, 2006 - Weekend numbers are in for the PlayStation 3's Japanese debut, and they aren't pretty. Enterbrain, the publisher of Japan's Weekly Famitsu magazine, reports today that Sony managed to sell 88,400 PlayStation 3 units over the system's first two days. This number breaks down to 33,800 20GB models and 54,600 60GB models.

If you think those hardware numbers are low then check out these software figures: the best selling game over the period was Bandai Namco's Ridge Racer 7, which sold 30,300 copies. This was followed by Gundam Crossfire at 30,000 units and Resistance, at 15,700 units. Figures for Genji and SEGA Golf Club, the two other launch titles, were not provided.

Enterbrain reports a software-hardware tie ratio of 0.98, meaning less than one game purchased for every PS3 sold.

These numbers sound eerily similar to the Xbox 360's launch last year. In its first two days, the 360 managed sales of 62,135 hardware units, Enterbrain reported in the days following the launch. The biggest selling game then was Ridge Racer 6, with 29,891 units, followed by Perfect Dark Zero, at 14,897 units.

Of course, the PS3 was, for all intents and purposes, sold out within hours of launch, while Microsoft filled Japanese shops with 100,000 additional 360 units, which have only recently gotten around to selling. The 360 is, technically, the number one next-generation system in Japan at this point, but that will likely change once Sony gets another shipment out. Something that we expect will happen some time in 2007.