We all know that the Nintendo DS Lite moves amazing numbers every single week, and this is especially pronounced in the country of its birth, Japan. The DS Lite is so popular, in fact, it seems to have taken over the moniker as gaming crack. What is it exactly that makes the Japanese clamor for this tiny little handheld console that regularly places it at the top of the weekly sales charts? A survey into the general gaming populace is crucial in shedding some light on the portable gaming habits of the Japanese.

Apparently, 45% of them responder to own a portable game device of some sort, with the GBA (that includes the GBA, the GBA SP, and the GB Micro) topping the list at 24.1%. The DS is up next with a 17.9% market share while its newer and sexier sibling, the DS Lite takes 14.4% of the cake. Where does the PSP stand amidst all these numbers? A paltry 10.7%. What is more interesting is the fact that 31.8% of DS Lite owners actually play with their handheld every single day, compared to a mere 14.7% of PSP owners. The two games that take up the most playing time are brain games, followed by RPGs. 59.6% of the respondents mentioned that they like the Touch Pen, while 60.7% claim that DS games were interesting.

Now, we don’t know what is the size of the sample population used in this survey, but being a nation that prides itself for having extremely punctual trains, we doubt that the results are tampered with and neither were the methods of sampling biased in anyway. What is your take on it? I myself am a proud owner of an Ice Blue Nintendo DS Lite, and definitely have not regretted purchasing it. All I know is, if you want to make a surefire hit - release some form of Brain Training RPG that requires plenty of stylus use in Japan, and you’ll be swimming in cold, hard cash.

Source: Portagames

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