Video game sales hit the wall in March
New March sales data from NPD Group reveals that video game sales are finally being hit (and hit hard) by the recession. Despite a strong showing through February, March sales across the board dropped by 15 percent to 18 percent year over year from 2008 to 2009.
As reported on Gamespot.com:
Although unnerving on their own, NPD's March numbers also signaled a more alarming trend. When taken into account, the month's numbers caused 2009's first-quarter game sales to go from solid growth to a near flat line. For the January-March period, the U.S. game industry generated $4.25 billion, barely up from the $4.24 billion that it generated during the same period in 2008.
So, is it time to panic? Probably not. There has been a dearth of new hit titles and the Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS (arguably both less expensive in terms of console and games) are the dominant platforms. Analysts have also suggested that with such a meteoric rise over the last year, the market was due for correction.
US VIDEO GAMES INDUSTRY - MARCH 2009
Software: $792.83M (-17 percent)
Hardware: $455.55M (-18 percent)
Accessories: $185.67M (-15 percent)
Total Games: $1.43B (-17 percent)
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Dave Rosenberg dishes up "Software, Interrupted" with nearly 15 years of technology and marketing experience that spans from Bell Labs to multiple start-up IPOs to open-source enterprise software companies. He is co-founder of MuleSource and currently serves as the general manager of Hardy Way. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can contact Dave via e-mail at softwareinterrupted@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @daveofdoom. 
I wouldn't be so quick to blame this on recession. As far as I know there were very few, if any, good video games released for March sales.
This might be a really good thing for the gaming industry if it gets rid of some of the junk titles that were just running off of flashy marketing. Studios who are willing to put the effort in and really make a good game can have a better chance of rising above the static.
- by sythara April 20, 2009 8:52 AM PDT
- For gods sake, games arent essential items like bread and milk. Just because companies keep pumping them out does not mean people will buy them. Right now majority of games suck, plain and simple. They are same remake of a remake built on a cookie cutter design. Console games are the worst in this, and people are finally smarting up and realising this.
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(6 Comments)Add that with rentals like Gamefly and of course game sales will go down.
PC market has been hit even worse. Look at the top sales on Steam, none of those are games that have been released in 2009, and most not even in 2008.
Game companies need to realize that when it comes to games, quantity is not quality in itself. Releasing a POS product over and over with a different name and/or number slapped on the cover will not bring in sales. And overhyped commercials do not really do all that much either.