In an effort to boost sales in Japan Microsoft has made plans to launch the Xbox 360 Elite in the home country of Nintendo and Sony.

The Elite will be out on October 11 and the price of YEN 47,800 ($390) has been mentioned.

Sales of the original 360 are slow in Japan at the moment with figures for the week ending June 24 showing that just 3400 360s were sold, compared with 65,500 Wiis and 9500 PS3s. Obviously Microsoft is counting on the Elite to regenerate interest.

The Elite was launched in the US back in April priced at $479, and as yet there has been no word of the Elite heading to Europe.