UK overtakes Japan: Here's the proof (2007 vs 2008)

Yes, you read that right. The UK is now the second biggest video games market.

Not sure if you read our last story on the world's top best selling games of 2008, but if you did (like Ripten.com) you might have spotted some monumental news.

The combination of Japan's shrinking video games market and the UK's massive growth has resulted in good 'ole Blighty overtaking Japan to become the second largest video games market in the world! Can you believe it!? It's not just Europe that leads over Japan now, but the UK alone!

Dorian Bloch of GfK Chart-Track revealed the news:

"UK console video game software units are more than double what was achieved in 2003, which just shows how fast the UK market has been growing.

"Because of this amazing growth and coupled with the downtown currently being experienced in Japan, the UK market has for the first time overtaken Japan as the No2 world market. Although still behind on revenue, the gap has narrowed considerably and it will be interesting to see how things develop during 2009."

Very interesting indeed. And if you don't believe us, we have a breakdown of the full revenue of the US, Japan and UK in both 2007 and 2008 - showing you just how the UK made the jump last year.

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2007 TOTAL SALES

US - 233.40m

Japan - 75.85m

UK - 58.20m

TOTAL - 367.70m

2008 TOTAL SALES

US - 268.40m

Japan - 66.05m

UK - 74.30m

TOTAL - 409.90M