WSJ: NPD Says Retail Videogame Sales Fell 25% In March
SAN FRANCISCO (Dow Jones)–U.S. retail sales of new videogame titles,
hardware and accessories fell 25% in February from a year earlier,
continuing the downward sales trend that has persisted since the holiday
shopping season.
Videogame-industry sales at U.S. brick-and-mortar retail shops fell to
$1.1 billion in March from nearly $1.5 billion, according to the latest
tallies from NPD Group, a market research firm. The top-selling game
for the month was Electronic Arts Inc.’s (EA) “Mass Effect 3,” marking
the first month this year a new title took the top spot. In February,
the top game, Activision Blizzard Inc.’s (ATVI) “Call of Duty: Modern
Warfare 3″ war-simulation shooter, which had been released late last
year, was the top game.
Retail sales, on the other hand, were particularly hard hit by falling
videogame hardware sales. Microsoft Corp.’s (MSFT) Xbox 360 was the
top-selling console again in March, continuing a trend that will likely
hold as a result of April’s release of its “Star Wars”-branded Xbox to
go along with its “Star Wars Kinect” arm-swinging, lightsaber dueling
game.
“While it was a disappointing month and first quarter for new physical
retail sales of video games hardware, software and accessories, it
wasn’t entirely unexpected given guidance we’ve seen from several
sources,” Anita Frazier, an analyst at NPD Group, said in a statement..
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20120412-716582.html
For the second year in a row, retail sales were down in the video game industry — the first time it has recorded negative growth in back to back years.
Call of Duty Black Ops
Source: Activision
Call of Duty Black Ops
The industry, as a whole, was down 6 percent compared to the 2009 figures, with sales of $18.58 billion. Software sales, which investors consider the best barometer of the industry’s health, were down 6 percent as well to $9.36 billion. (Adding in PC sales, the amount climbed to $10.1 billion, a 5 percent drop from last year.)
From 2010 :
Video Game Sales Drop 6% in 2010, Second Year of Declines
Like 2009’s numbers, the disappointing results come despite 2010 boasting the biggest game release in the industry’s history — and the industry’s hottest peripheral. “Call of Duty: Black Ops” boasted sales of $1 billion in just six weeks…..
From 2009 :
by Daniel Terdiman November 12, 2009 4:31 PM PS
Video game sales fall off a ledge in October
With total industry sales down 19 percent from a year earlier, things are looking bleak as the holiday season gets under way.
These drops are continuous, and are even worse when you factor out call of Duty and GTA, the industry is dead. It is dying even WITH those titles, it is in dire trouble. That’s the problem with percentage drops, year after year. They are multiplicative. If you do the math, you will see the total is down 71% from 2007, a fact reported on by the WSJ, this drop occurred over the past year and continues from previous drops, which were already down. But I guess this is part of the “improvement” you mention, and notice, it is industry wide.
- astrophysics
