UK Charts: FIFA hangs on at the top

FIFA 2004 fought off a posse of new releases this week to maintain its headlock on the nation's top slot to make it three straight weeks at No.1 for EA.

THQ's fifth SmackDown title Here Comes The Pain was the highest new entry at No.2, while Activision had a good week with its two main releases charting well in the Full Price chart: True Crime at No.3 (No.1 Xbox, No.3 PS2), and Call Of Duty at No.9 (No.2 PC) - and all the more creditable for being new franchises.

Affiliate label LucasArts fared less well with its two Star Wars releases, with the GameCube-only Rebel Strike at No.13 (No.1 GameCube), and the PC MMORPG Star Wars: An Empire Divided charting at No.38 (No.8 PC).

Ubi Soft's big Xbox hope Rainbow Six 3, meanwhile, entered at No.14 on the Full Price listings (No.3 Xbox), while EA's Harry Potter: Quidditch World Cup managed a relatively lowly No.17. Microsoft's out-of-season tennis title Top Spin made it to No.25 (No.5 Xbox), while Capcom's Xbox-exclusive Dino Crisis 3 just scraped into the Xbox chart at No.20.

Of the recent big new releases, Simpsons: Hit And Run climbed to No.4, SSX 3 dropped to No.5, Pro Evolution 3 slid to No.7, Worms 3D inched up to No.15, F-Zero GX plummeted to No.24, Jak II went down to No.28, Max Payne 2 slid dramatically by 20 places to No.29, while Buffy: Chaos Bleeds similarly crashed to No.36.

This week's Missing In Action awards go to: Codemasters' Pop Idol, Eidos' Backyard Wrestling (details elsewhere in the news), Acclaim's NBA Jam, EA's NBA Live 2004, Nintendo/Kemco's GBA title TG Rally, and a host of obscurities and unmentionables.

This week sees another slew of big new releases, notably the awesome Mario Kart: Double Dash!!, LOTR: Return Of The King, Pokemon Pinball, Amped 2, Terminator 3, Beyond Good And Evil and Broken Sword: Sleeping Dragon, slippage permitting.