Amazon Japan has sold out of Xbox Series pre-orders for the second time

Amazon Japan has sold out of Xbox Series X and S pre-orders for the second time in the region.

The retailer made the second wave of console stock available on Friday morning and both X and S consoles quickly sold out in a matter of hours.

It’s the second time Xbox Series X and S pre-orders have quickly sold out in Japan. During the first pre-order phase in September, Series X sold out in less than 20 minutes on Amazon Japan. An hour later, the Series S was also sold out at the retailer.

Major Japanese electronics chains Yodobashi, Softmap and BicCamera also sold out of all their initial Xbox Series X and S stock within just a few hours of opening pre-orders.

Given Xbox’s historically poor market performance in Japan, Series X and S stock allocation is unlikely to have been high for the region’s pre-orders. Regardless, it’s a positive start in a country where Xbox has typically struggled, but one which it recently claimed had become its fastest-growing.

Commenting on the pre-order performance in September, Head of Xbox Phil Spencer said he was humbled but added that it was “the first step in a much longer marathon.”

“It humbles me to consider how well the Xbox Series X/S has been welcomed by Japanese fans,” he told Famitsu (translated by VGC).

“With the goals we’re working towards for the Xbox Series X/S, this is only the first step in a much longer marathon, but I’m very happy to know how much everyone is expecting from us, and it motivates us even more when pre orders sell out.”

Speaking during a separate Tokyo Games Show live stream last month, Spencer claimed the platform holder had learnt from past mistakes and intended to better cater to Japanese players during this console generation.

That will include launching Xbox Series X and Series S in Japan on November 10—”day and date with our biggest global markets”—and bringing cloud gaming service xCloud to the country “in the first half of 2021”.

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Phil Spencer says he’s ‘humbled’ by Japanese Xbox Series X/S sellouts

But exec calls pre-order performance “the first step in a much longer marathon”