PS2 and Game Boy Advance (GBA) again dominated videogame hardware...

week ago (CED April 19 p7). GBA followed with 44.25% (vs. 44.52%) -- 39.73% for the front-lit GBA SP model and 4.52% for the standard version. GameCube’s share decreased to 6.14% from 6.35%. But Nintendo’s console again fared far better than Xbox, which saw its share drop to 0.52% from 0.57%. Trailing not far behind Microsoft’s console were again Sony’s legacy PS one console (0.32%) and Bandai’s SwanCrystal handheld system (0.19%). MC said the top 100-selling games in the week totaled about 605,000 units -- 6.82% better than a week ago but 48.77% less than the weekly average. Eight new titles made the rankings this week and their share represented 40.95% of total unit videogame sales, MC said. It said Nintendo’s Kirby: Labyrinth in the Mirror for GBA -- the week’s #1-selling game -- sold about 189,000 units. MC said the game’s predecessor -- Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land -- sold about 213,000 units in its first week and went on to sell 848,000 units. Therefore, MC said, “one can expect [a] further increase in unit sales for this new sequel.” Among the other new releases, MC said about 19,000 units of Banpresto’s #3 Crayon Shin-chan: Arashi wo Yobu Cinema Land no Dai Boken for GBA were sold vs. about 18,000 of Koei’s #5 Crimson Sea 2 for PS2. There were 2 other GBA titles in the top 10: Nintendo’s Famicom Mini: Super Mario Bros. at #4 (down 2 from a week ago) and Pokemon’s Pokemon Fire Red at #6 (down one). The rest of the top 10 were PS2 games: Square Enix’s Dragon Warrior V at #2 (down one), Koei’s Dynasty Warriors 4: Empires at #7 again, Koei’s Nobunaga’s Ambition: Tenka Sousei at #8 (down 2), Konami’s Pro Baseball Spirits 2004 at #9 and Capcom’s Monster Hunter at #10 (down 2).