August NPD: PS3 sales soar as gamers go batty for Arkham Asylum in a Madden world

By Randy Nelson
This year's August NPD sales numbers were, as usual, dominated by EA's monolithic Madden franchise — but who's that creeping out of the shadows? "I'm Batman."

Rocksteady, Warner Bros. and Eidos officially have themselves a critical and commercial hit in Batman: Arkham Asylum, with the game having sold more than half a million copies across PS3 and 360 in its first week on sale. Even the Joker can't laugh at sales like that.

Hardware saw a slight increase for the month, with the exception of PS3, which saw an impressive 72% jump in sales, no doubt due to early sales of the lower-priced 120GB slim SKU. Wii is still the best-selling home console, but its numbers are gradually dipping down into "maybe we should consider a price cut, too" territory. Here's how sales of the stuff we play are games on stacked up:

-DS: 553K14K (+2%)
-Wii: 277K24K (+9%)
-360: 215K12K (+6%)
-PS3: 210K88K (+72%)
-PSP: 140K17K (+13%)
-PS2: 106K2K (-2%

Check out the software sales chart after the break.

  1. Madden NFL 10 – 360 – EA – 928K
  2. Wii Sports Resort (w/ Wii Motion Plus) – Wii – Nintendo – 754K
  3. Madden NFL 10 – PS3 – EA – 665K
  4. Batman: Arkham Asylum* – 360 – Eidos – 303K
  5. Batman: Arkham Asylum* – PS3 – Eidos – 290K
  6. Madden NFL 10 – PS2 – EA – 160K
  7. Dissidia: Final Fantasy – PSP – Square Enix – 130K
  8. Wii Fit (w/ Balance Board) – Wii – Nintendo – 128K
  9. Mario Kart (w/ Wheel) – Wii – Nintendo – 120K
  10. Fossil Fighters – DS – Nintendo – 92K

* Includes Collector's, Limited and Bundled Editions

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