Gears of War shoots into Japanese top 10

No one can argue that Gears of War hasn't been a massive success. The title has sold more than 3 million units worldwide--it was the third best-selling game of 2006 in the US and the 18th best-selling game in the UK. It also won GameSpot's Game of the Year award and overtook Halo 2 as the most popular game on Xbox Live.

Now the Xbox 360-exclusive title can boast another feather in its cap. The game was released on January 18 in Japan--a region where Western-developed shooters have historically not proved popular. However, Gears of War managed to break into the country's top 10 sales list, selling 33,212 copies in its first week and debuting in the charts at number seven, according to Media Create.

There were a total of eight new titles in the top 10 of the Japanese charts last week, with .hack//G.U. Vol. 3 making it to number one, having sold 136,790 copies since its release.