Nintendo’s DS handheld game-player is a runaway success. Global investors have bid the share price of the Kyoto-based company up 84% over the last 12 months. This just ain’t a coincident.

Back in July, Nintendo announced Japanese hardware sales of 2,340,000 units of both the original Nintendo DS and new DS Lite in the last three months, as well as 1,420,000 in Europe and 780,000 in North America. In addition, the company released equally impressive lifetime sales numbers as well for both iterations of the handheld, which put it at 9,240,000 in Japan, 6,130,000 in Europe and 5,900,000 in North America. This adds up to a worldwide title of 21,270,000 units after around a year and a half on sale.

By just looking at DS sales in the U.S. market, where the handheld device player once lagged Sony’s PSP handheld, Nintendo has sold 600,000 DS handhelds, more than any other game-hardware maker. DS titles New Super Mario Bros. and Brain Age were the first and third bestselling games.

While the PSP, like the PlayStation2, is largely the preserve of the usual 18- to 35-year-old male demographic, titles like Nintendogs and the Brain Training For Adults series are proving hits with women and the age-35-plus gamers. Games are relatively simple and go beyond one-person shooters and sports simulations.

For example, in Nintendogs, you can teach your virtual pet tricks by calling its name, or play a game of fetch by tossing a ball with the stylus, a pen-like device that works with the touch pad. That has scored well with female gamers. Meanwhile, the Brain Training series—Brain Age in the U.S.—which asks gamers to solve arithmetic puzzles has gone down well with baby boomers. In Japan alone, Nintendo brain-training games have sold over 4.5 million units.

With this kind of success, people are now talking whether Nintedo Wii will trump Playstation 3’s position. It’s indeed a fact that Playstation still leads the market in high end video gaming (in terms of accumulated hardware and software sales). However, we’ll have to see the sales numbers by the end of this year (and the years to come) to draw a conclusion of who’s the new market leader in the video game market.