UK Charts: God of War beats Donkey Kong to No.1 Nintendo Labo slips down the charts in a quiet week for games retail

Christopher Dring Head of Games B2B Monday 7th May 2018 Share this article Share

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Another quiet week for the physical games market, with just a single new release in the Top 40.

That belongs to the excellent Nintendo Switch platformer Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, which debuts at No.2. We say debuts, it's technically a re-entry as the game is a port of an equally excellent Wii U game. Yet considering the Wii U version only sold 44 units this week, we're going to class it as a standalone title.

In just one week, the Switch version of the game already accounts for nearly 17% of the total number of copies the game has sold in the UK (physical units only). Week one sales of the Switch version were 53.7% higher than week one sales of the Wii U version (although Switch does have a considerably higher install base).

The game originally launched on Wii U in February 2014 and is the fifth game in the Donkey Kong Country series, which first began on the SNES in 1994.

That means it is a third consecutive week at the top for PS4 exclusive God of War. The game's sales fell 56% week-on-week, yet it retains the top sport comfortably. It's the first time since The Last of Us: Remastered in July 2014 that a Sony published title has scored three consecutive weeks at No.1.

With nothing major coming to market this week, there's a good chance that the action game will secure a fourth straight No.1.

There are five first party games in the Top Ten this week (six in the Top 11) with PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, Super Mario Odyssey and Mario Kart 8: Deluxe joining the aforementioned two.

In fact, expect first party titles to dominate the month, with Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition (Nintendo), State of Decay 2 (Microsoft) and Detroit: Beyond Human (PlayStation) all set to arrive during May.

There were a few notable movers this week. The latest Avengers movie has done the trick for LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2, which rises to No.6 following a 26% sales increase. While a bit of price activity on Microsoft's inventive new IP Sea of Thieves sees the game rise to No.11 with a 63% sales uptick.

Last week's Nintendo Labo products meanwhile take a tumble. The Variety Pack drops from No.3 to No.13 with a 62% sales slide, while the Robot kit has vanished from the Top 40 entirely.

And seeing as it is such a rare sight, GTA V falls out of the boxed Top Ten this week to No.12 (although sales did actually increase 2% week-on-week).

Here is the UKIE/GfK Top Ten for the week ending May 5th.