The PSP is moving on up . . . at least in Japan. The newly re-designed Playstation Portable Slim sold 15,564 units the week of September 3-9, but then spiked up an incredible amount to 95,487 due to the release of Square Enix’s Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII which was released on September 13th.
The jump in sales of the PSP though was also due to the Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII 10th Anniversary Bundle, which included the re-designed PSP Slim before it’s official release date of September 20th, allowing Final Fantasy fans to snag both the game and system a little early.
First week sales of the PSP Slim totaled 250,702 units, and that has now risen to 326,645 as of September 23rd as the brisk sales continue. 75,943 of those sales numbers are of the Crisis Core bundle.
The Slim PSP was first unveiled during this E3 2007 and according to Kaz Hirai, president of Sony Computer Entertainment America, the system is 33 percent lighter and 19 percent slimmer, also giving more efficient battery life, faster load times, and features a video-out jack so you can watch UMD movies on your TV.
According to Enterbrain, the company that owns Famitsu, the combined total of PSP new and old sales is 6,217,664 in Japan since it debuted in December 2004. — GS