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Black Friday weekend always gives the video game chart a bit of a shake-up. While Pokemon Brilliant Diamond debuted at number one in the UK boxed chart two weeks ago, and Shining Pearl made it to number two, that wasn't going to last for a second week. Black Friday beckoned and it led to Brilliant Diamond dropping to six and Shining Pearl falling out of the top ten entirely.
Brilliant Diamond was replaced with another Switch game, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. Deluxe has pretty much remained in the top ten ever since it launched in 2017, resulting in it recently becoming the best-selling Mario Kart game ever. The game was bundled with the Switch in a special Black Friday deal this year which resulted in a 567% jump in sales week-on-week and a return to the top of the chart.
FIFA 22 and Minecraft on Switch also benefitted from a strong Black Friday despite sales of boxed games being significantly down year-on-year. According to Gamesindustry.biz, sales of boxed games dropped by 10% this Black Friday week compared to the same period last year. That equates to about 100,000 fewer copies sold. It was also highlighted by Christopher Dring that Minecraft has now overtaken Breath of the Wild to become the fourth best-selling game on Switch in the UK.
Mario Kart wasn't the only game to benefit from a Black Friday price cut. Guardians of the Galaxy is back up to number five, Just Dance 2022 is at seven, and Far Cry 6 is still in the top ten at number nine. Battlefield 2042 has fallen out of the top ten to number 12 after two weeks on the market, just one spot higher than Farming Simulator 22 which was the highest placing new release last week. The latter beat Battlefield on Steam though, hitting a higher concurrent player count than its boxed chart neighbor.
This coming week's chart will be an interesting one as there's nothing much in the way of anything massive launching until next week. The chart after that will include Halo Infinite and presumably GTA: The Trilogy: The Definitive Edition as the collection gets a physical edition on December 7. Rockstar will be hoping those who have held out for a boxed copy of the game haven't been put off doing so by the game's many ongoing issues.