Gears of War Makes Japanese Top 10 List

If you're a betting gamer and were asked to wager on the potential success of a gritty, bloody shooter in the land of the rising RPG, there's a good chance you'd be taking a loss with this week's Japanese sales numbers.  Gears of War appears on the list as the seventh most purchased game in japan last week.

This bit of news should silence some of the speculation (even my own) that Gears sold out in some Japanese stores only because the title was stocked in low supply.  In case you were wondering, yes there were more than seven video games on sale in Japan last week.

Epic's amazing but not-quite-epic shooter sold over 33,000 units, beating out such Japanese mainstays as Animal Crossing, Pokemon and New Super Mario Brothers for the top end of the list.  Did Microsoft send a guy with a huge suitcase and a credit card to Japan, or are Japanese gamers harder to define than previously thought?

Here is the list via Kotaku for last week:

1. .hack//G.U. Vol. 3 (PS2) - 136,790 / new
2. Wario: The Seven (DS) - 91,249 / new
3. Shining Force EXA (PS2) - 72,306 / new
4. Wii Sports (WII) - 57,418 / 851,535
5. Wii Play (WII) - 45,724 / 764,813
6. Dragon Shadow Spell (PS2) - 40,541 / new
7. Gears of War (360) - 33,212 / new
8. Seikaiju Maze (DS) - 32,511 / new
9. Common Knowledge Training (DS) - 31,735 / 1,130,647
10. More Brain Age (DS) - 29,626 / 3,868,279