NPD Results & Charts April 2009; Wii Approaches 20 Million Sold

NPD: US Hardware Sales for February 2009

PlayStation 2 131K
PlayStation 3 276K
PSP 199K
Xbox 360 391K
Wii 753K
Nintendo DS 588K


Stay right here for all the latest charts and analysis.

US: HD Systems Losing Still More Ground to the Wii

US - The Wii has now surpassed all gains that the HD Console market made before the tiny-white-system-that-could went on sale. Combined, the XBOX 360 and the Playstation 3 have a 3.01 million system lead on the Wii--a little less than what they started with when the Wii launched.

The HD systems (referenced by the intelligentsia of gamderdom as "Next Gen") looked to be gaining momentum against the onslaught of Nintendo's mass-audience appeal, and at one point had a 5.4 million system lead on the Wii.

Now, that lead is disappearing just as quickly as copies of Wii Fit are moving off the shelf. Why is such a nebulous number important? Because analysts, including this one, have suggested that perhaps the combined numbers of HD system sales were keeping 3rd parties from making serious games for the Wii.

That argument barely holds water at this point. The HD-to-Wii ratio has been dropping nearly every month for the past year and still the Wii looks to be the stepsister of western-focused genres. The current and probably most accurate statement at this time is that 3rd parties have whole-heartedly dismissed the Wii as an "outside the hardcore" demographic and are treating it accordingly.

This latest news, though, might begin the turnaround of that perception. The Wii continues to sell despite the down economy, generally something one would expect for systems with a harder-core following. Japanese companies are committing to it, including titles like Madworld, Monster Hunter, and Dragon Quest X (a little further off).

Perhaps that will change in the west as well. EA has supposedly started to focus its energies on the Wii platform despite the majority of its catalog selling millions of copies on the 360 and PS3 (see: Madden, Burnout, etc). Maybe by focus, they mean, "make quality games for it." That would be an interesting change from the what many 3rd parties have done so far.

(click to enlarge)

Nintendo Propels Industry to Record Month

US - Following record sales of 2 million Wii consoles in November, Nintendo sales led the way to a new industry-wide record in December: $5 billion in revenue, the largest single month in video game history.

According to NPD, December sales were up 9 percent year-over-year, and sales for 2008 were up 19 percent.

Nintendo’s handheld, the DS, sold 3.04 million units, almost as many as the Wii and Xbox 360 combined (2.15 million and 1.44 million, respectively). Regarding software, the Wii’s console bundle, Wii Play and the Wii remote, sold 1.46 million units in December alone.

December 2008 Sales

1. Wii Play (Nintendo, Wii) - 1.46 million

2. Call of Duty: World at War (Treyarch/Activision, Xbox 360) - 1.33 million

3. Wii Fit (Nintendo, Wii) - 999,000

4. Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo, Wii) - 979,000

5. Guitar Hero: World Tour (Neversoft/Activision, Wii) - 850,000

6. Gears of War 2 (Epic Games/Microsoft, Xbox 360) - 745,000

7. Left 4 Dead (Valve/EA, Xbox 360) - 629,000

8. Mario Kart DS (Nintendo, NDS) - 540,000

9. Call of Duty: World at War (Treyarch/Activision, PS3) - 533,000

10. Animal Crossing: City Folk (Nintendo, Wii) - 497,000

2008 Full Year Sales

1. Wii Play (Nintendo, Wii) - 5.28 million

2. Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo, Wii) - 5.00 million

3. Wii Fit (Nintendo, Wii) - 4.53 million

4. Super Smash Bros. Brawl (Nintendo, Wii) - 4.17 million

5. Grand Theft Auto IV (Rockstar/Take-Two, Xbox 360) - 3.29 million

6. Call of Duty: World at War (Treyarch/Activision, Xbox 360) - 2.75 million

7. Gears of War 2 (Epic Games/Microsoft, Xbox 360) - 2.31 million

8. Grand Theft Auto IV (Rockstar/Take-Two, PS3) - 1.89 million

9. Madden NFL 09 (EA Tiburon/EA, Xbox 360) - 1.87 million

10. Mario Kart DS (Nintendo, NDS) - 1.65 million

(Charts from gamasutra.com)

November 2008 NPD Results - Wii Sells 2 Million!

Sorry for the delay on this post. Family in town and various other distractions. I wish I had been here earlier to post this amazing story, but this will have to be it for now. I'll post the totals and one small chart and the rest of the charts should be up throughout the weekend. Also, HOLY SHIT at Wii sales!

Hardware
Playstation 2 206k
Playstation 3 378k
PSP 421k
Xbox 360 836k
Wii 2.04M
DS 1.57M



GEARS OF WAR 2* (360) 1.56 million
CALL OF DUTY: WORLD AT WAR* (360) 1.41 million
WII PLAY W/ REMOTE (WII) 796K
WII FIT (WII) 697K
MARIO KART (WII) 637K
CALL OF DUTY: WORLD AT WAR (PS3) 597K
GUITAR HERO WORLD TOUR* (WII) 475K
LEFT 4 DEAD (360) 410K
RESISTANCE 2* (PS3) 385K
WII MUSIC (WII) 297K

Stay right here for all the latest charts. Coming Soon: Full NPD charts and breakdown, Media Create Hardware, Consoles and Handheld charts. All will be out before the weekend is up. Enjoy!

October 2008 NPD Analysis (Gamasutra)

Read the entire article @ Gamasutra

October 2008 NPD Results - LBP Outsold by Mario Kart

NPD results are as follows. Stay right here for the latest in NPD Charts and graphs. That PS3 number looks BAD.

Hardware
Hardware Unit Sales
Oct-08
PlayStation 2 136K
PlayStation 3 190K
PSP 193K
Xbox 360 371K
Wii 803K
Nintendo DS 491K



Platform Charts
(click to enlarge for all charts)



Overall Charts


Top 10 Software
Publisher Release Date Rank # Units
360 FABLE II MICROSOFT (CORP) Oct-08 1 790K
WII FIT W/ BALANCE BOARD NINTENDO OF AMERICA May-08 2 487K
360 FALLOUT 3 BETHESDA SOFTWORKS Oct-08 3 375K
WII MARIO KART W/ WHEEL NINTENDO OF AMERICA Apr-08 4 290K
WII PLAY W/ REMOTE NINTENDO OF AMERICA Feb-07 5 282K
360 SAINTS ROW 2 THQ (CORP) Oct-08 6 270K
PS3 SOCOM: U.S. NAVY SEALS CONFRONTATION SONY (CORP) Oct-08 7 231K
PS3 LITTLE BIG PLANET SONY (CORP) Oct-08 8 215K
360 NBA 2K9 TAKE 2 INTERACTIVE (CORP) Oct-08 9 202K
360 DEAD SPACE ELECTRONIC ARTS Oct-08 10 193K


Industry Sales
Dollar Sales Oct-07 Oct-08 CHG YTD Oct 07 YTD Oct 08 CHG
Video Games $1.12B $1.31B 18% $10.50B $13.13B 25%
Video Games Hardware $470.47M $494.74M 5% $4.13B $4.72B 14%
Video Games Software $514.60M $696.79M 35% $4.98B $6.76B 36%
Video Game Accessories $130.81M $120.19 -8% $1.40B $1.65B 18%

World Markets Comparison (NPD, GfK, Enterbrain)

An international market report has revealed that the world’s three largest game markets – Japan, the US and the UK – have experienced markedly contrasting rates of growth and decline for the third calendar-quarter.

The Top Global Markets Report – which aggregates data from the NPD Group, GfK Chart-Track as well as Enterbrain – reveals that the UK videogame market rose 15 percent over the same period last year. For the same July-September period, the US held a steady 8 percent growth over last year’s results while Japan saw its market tumble 21 percent.

The report has provided point-of-sale data for video game software sales in all three markets.

Read the entire report @ EDGE.

We will be using this data to produce the best comparisons for every market and every console. Stay right here for the latest in worldwide sales charts. Expect updates to this throughout the week.

Do Exclusive Titles Hurt the Competition? EEDAR Say "Yes."

Interesting article up today over at Gamasutra which quotes EEDAR expert Jessee Divinich. Read it HERE.

Divinich looked at several exclusive high-profile/AAA titles and compared hardware results across all systems in months that they launched. It is unclear what exactly made a title "high profile" or "AAA." Whether it was total development and marketing budget, total sales in a previous iteration, or just standard gamer lexicon is never stated.

Analysis
While the conclusion seems obvious, AAA titles that cannot be purhased on a particular system hurt that system, the data used for making that conclusion seems to overlook numerous other factors, or at least those factors aren't stated or implicitly understood.

First and already noted is the issue with the definition of "AAA exclusive." I realize that, like porn, you know it when you see it, but it still needs to be defined to make proper conclusions.

Second is the issue with the same-month comparison of hardware sales in the month of the exclusive title. By the included chart (source: Gamasutra), we cannot tell without research exactly which month the game in question was released, whether the systems on which it was not released were in a current monthly decline, and whether or not the sales bump from the exclusive lasted past the month in view.

This is an interesting idea and one that clearly has merit on its face alone. Nothing is more important to hardcore gamers than games they can only play on one system; exclusive titles with huge followings can have a measurable impact on buying decisions. Every gamer in his or her heart would readily conclude that exclusive titles absolutely hurt other system's sales. This just isn't proof of that.

USA Today: Music Games Generate $2 Billion in 2 Years

"There are a lot of new games coming out for this genre," says Anita Frazier of market tracking firm NPD Group. "Some will do well, some won't. The challenge for each newcomer to the genre is to differentiate and communicate how it's special or brings some new magic to the table."

Music-game sales have risen from $132 million in 2005, when Hero was first released, to more than $1.2 billion last year and $896 million so far this year.

The category, Frazier says, "was very small before Guitar Hero and Rock Band came on the scene."

Read the entire article HERE.

NPD: Behind The Numbers, September 2008 (Gamasutra)

All charts produced by Gamasutra:








Read the entire article HERE.

Analysts: US Game Sales will rebound in October

"While overall sales growth was negative, implying that the consumer is beginning to feel the effects of the economic downturn, it was above most expectations, with solid hardware sales implying continued software sales strength through the holidays," says Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter.

"We expect October software sales to be solidly higher than last year’s, and believe that any perceptions of consumer weakness caused by the September data will be reversed next month."

Lazard Capital Markets' Colin Sebastian agrees that industry sales will pick up again in October, thanks to more Wii supplies, Xbox 360 price cuts and a strong lineup of releases for the month. The analyst pegs EA, Activision and Ubisoft as the likely leaders, expecting EA's Rock Band 2 and Left 4 Dead; Activision Blizzard's Wrath of the Lich King and Guitar Hero; and Ubi's Prince of Persia and Far Cry 2 to be among the month's winners.

Cowen Group analyst Doug Creutz says that as far as his firm's concerned, September NPD actually exceeded bleak expectations, and the results should "allay investor concerns."

Does this look down to you?

Read the entire article HERE.

September 2008 NPD Results

Hardware
[Wii] 687.0K
[NDS] 536.8K
[360] 347.2K
[PSP] 238.1K
[PS3] 232.4K
[PS2] 173.5K

Top 10 SW Sales
Publisher Release Date Rank # Units
360 STAR WARS: THE FORCE UNLEASHED LUCASARTS Sep-08 1 610K
WII WII FIT W/ BALANCE BOARD NINTENDO OF AMERICA May-08 2 518K
360 ROCK BAND 2 MTV GAMES/ELECTRONIC ARTS Sep-08 3 363K
WII MARIO KART W/ WHEEL NINTENDO OF AMERICA Apr-08 4 353K
PS3 STAR WARS: THE FORCE UNLEASHED LUCASARTS Sep-08 5 325K
360 MERCENARIES 2: WORLD IN FLAMES ELECTRONIC ARTS Aug-08 6 297K
WII WII PLAY W/ REMOTE NINTENDO OF AMERICA Feb-07 7 243K
360 MADDEN NFL 09 ELECTRONIC ARTS Aug-08 8 224K
WII STAR WARS: THE FORCE UNLEASHED LUCASARTS Sep-08 9 223K
PS2 MADDEN NFL 09 ELECTRONIC ARTS Aug-08 10 158K


Check out the console charts HERE.

In-depth NPD Analysis by Edge's Matt Matthews: August 2008

Matt Matthew's monthly NPD article (and insider access from the NPD themselves) once again produces one of the best US Game Sales analysis around. Please read the entire article HERE. Great read.

Here are the condensed major points:
1. Madden Sales: Hardcore Market (males 18-32) are without question fully invested in the HD consoles and Madden sales prove that. Or perhaps the 'casual-friendly' changes to the game were completely rejected by any audience that would have been interested?

2. Entry price is key; 360 doing well, PS3 needs to cut their price (but won't), and Nintendo has "the most robust console and handheld sales the industry has ever seen," instead they should actually raise the price to slow shortages! (said in jest).

3. If a picture is worth one thousand words, then Dennis Dyak's antics were only worth 168,000 units sold for Too human. or 168 pictures, assuming words were units sold. or something. I'm not sure this analogy works. I'll get back to you on this one.

4. This is the first month where sales-growth in the game industry may be reflecting larger concerns about the US economy.

New Charts from EDGE: