While April saw a healthy 20 percent lift at U.S. video game retail, NPD Group said Monday that total U.S. sales for May were down 14 percent to $743.1 million - the lowest recorded monthly retail performance in years, the firm said.
NPD analyst Anita Frazier in a statement reminded industry watchers that the figures do not include emerging digital business models, only traditional physical retail.
"Keeping in mind that these sales figures represent just the new physical portion of the market for video game hardware, software, and accessories and not the growing portion of the industry that is comprised of digital format content distribution, May 2011 was the lowest month of sales for the industry since October 2006," she explained. "A light slate of new releases is at the heart of this month's performance."
Hardware
Microsoft said that it had the best-selling home console for yet another month, with 270,000 units sold in the U.S. during May. Frazier said, "Overall, the Xbox 360 platform has contributed 34 percent of year-to-date revenues (across hardware, content and accessories) generated by new physical retail sales, gaining 7 share points over last year."
NPD no longer releases hardware sales unit figure every month, leaving that to the discretion of Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo. But NPD said video game hardware generated $228.9 million during the month, down 5 percent year-on-year.
"Sales of the 3DS were light, but with next Sunday's release of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D, we will begin to see a slate of strong content come to market for the 3DS, which should help to significantly boost sales of hardware during the remainder of 2011," Frazier said.
She added, "Combined sales of the PS3 and Xbox 360 (HD hardware) are up 28 percent for the month and 21 percent year to date. Although the declines in console hardware sales in 2011 are attributable to the Wii, the platform remains the best-selling of this generation at nearly 36 million installed in the U.S."
"At the current rate of growth and decline (on a year-to-date basis) for each of the respective console systems, a year from now the Wii will still enjoy the lead in install base in the U.S., although both the Xbox 360 and PS3 will close the gap. Of course, new details on hardware introduction could certainly change the picture," Frazier said.
Software
Software during May generated $375.8 million at U.S. retail, down 19 percent year-on-year. Take-Two's Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 game L.A. Noire led sales for the month on the all-platforms list, followed by the Bethesda-published Brink.
While NPD does not typically release monthly sales numbers for software, Giant Bomb reports that L.A. Noire sold 889,000 copies across the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
"This month's story really is about a light new release schedule as compared to last year," said Frazier. "There were 42 new SKU's introduced in May as compared to 58 last May, and 72 in 2009. This is reflected in the share of dollars contributed by May releases, which was 28% in 2011 as compared to 41 percent last year." She added, "As a result of a lighter release slate, promotional activity at retail and in circulars was reduced as well, which undoubtedly affected not only planned but impulse purchases."
Frazier pointed to specific genres that helped drive down new retail game sales: "The top genres contributing to the decline in new physical software sales were Action/Driving hybrid (Red Dead Redemption) and Platform/Scrolling Character (Super Mario Galaxy 2)."
She continued, "Despite strong continued sales of Pokemon Black & White, the RPG genre also declined since the new games did not comp the performance of [Pokemon] HeartGold and SoulSilver last year. Dance games, first-person shooters and general adventure grew, primarily due to notable titles like Just Dance 2, Brink, Portal 2 and L.A. Noire."
Frazier also said that during May, software unit sales were down across all platforms "except for Xbox 360," which was only up by 1 percent year-on-year.
"Keep in mind that purchases of content are increasingly occurring in digital format, and May saw a notable digital release in the second map pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops which was titled Escalation," the analyst noted. "Undoubtedly, this shifted some dollars that might have been spent on new physical content at retail."
Accessories during May were down 6 percent to $114 million for the month. Frazier said four of the top 10 accessories NPD tracked were points or subscription cards.
Top 10 Games (New Physical Retail only; across all platforms incl. PC)
Rank
Publisher
L.A. Noire (360, PS3)
1
Take 2 Interactive
Brink (360, PS3, PC)
2
Bethesda Softworks
Lego Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game (Wii, 360, NDS, PS3, 3DS, PSP, PC)
3
Disney Interactive Studios
Portal 2 (360, PS3, PC)
4
Electronic Arts
Mortal Kombat 2011 (PS3, 360)
5
Warner Bros. Interactive
Call of Duty: Black Ops (360, PS3, Wii, NDS, PC)
6
Activision Blizzard
Zumba Fitness: Join the Party (Wii, 360, PS3)
7
Majesco
NBA 2K11 (360, PS3, Wii, PS2, PSP, PC)
8
Take 2 Interactive
Just Dance 2 (Wii)
9
Ubisoft
Lego Star Wars III: The Clone Wars (Wii, NDS, 360, PS3, 3DS, PSP, PC)
"NPD analyst Anita Frazier in a statement reminded industry watchers that the figures do not include emerging digital business models, only traditional physical retail. "
What didital business she is talking about, the PSN? It's revenue was 0 last month, interesting, the Anita Frazier forgot to remind industry watchers of this.
Another question that comes to mind, the charts include the PC versions of the games, does the revenues include PC revenues as well? And if they do, did the october 2006 numbers included them as well?
When it becomes necessary, digital sales will be included in order to "circle the wagons" and mask the declining sales. This is why individual SKU sales were replaced with group console sales. It's easy to give the impression that the industry is growing when you're packing together 3-7 boxes. It's a nice little trick.
"At the current rate of growth and decline (on a year-to-date basis) for each of the respective console systems, a year from now the Wii will still enjoy the lead in install base in the U.S., although both the Xbox 360 and PS3 will close the gap. Of course, new details on hardware introduction could certainly change the picture," Frazier said.
That seems somewhat theatrical (for the purpose of creating a story).
Over the first 5 months this year the 360 has outsold the Wii by an average of 88000 units/month.
The Wii has a 8.8 million unit lead in the US.
At that rate it would take 100 months (nearly 8 years) for the 360 to have the bigger install base.
(the PS3 numbers at current pace of 24000 more units/month would take 64 years, so that one doesn't seem worth mentioning at all actually)
Assuming the rate doubles it would be 4 years still for the 360 (32 for the PS3).
Stating that a year from now the Wii will still have the lead, but the gap is closing is true, but it seems like a misrepresentation of the numbers to make a story. It's far more likely we'll move onto the next generation of hardware before 8 or even 4 years are up, so the accompanying statement seems misleading. (I always worry when supposedly "non-biased results" are delivered in such a way as to create a headline)
Notably I'd guess the software sales gap is much closer and that the 360 could overtake the Wii during this generation. Software sales aren't released publicly though, so I'm not sure, but I'd expect that to be a more likely scenario (though perhaps maybe not as headline attention grabbing?)
What didital business she is talking about, the PSN? It's revenue was 0 last month, interesting, the Anita Frazier forgot to remind industry watchers of this.
Another question that comes to mind, the charts include the PC versions of the games, does the revenues include PC revenues as well? And if they do, did the october 2006 numbers included them as well?
That seems somewhat theatrical (for the purpose of creating a story).
Over the first 5 months this year the 360 has outsold the Wii by an average of 88000 units/month.
The Wii has a 8.8 million unit lead in the US.
At that rate it would take 100 months (nearly 8 years) for the 360 to have the bigger install base.
(the PS3 numbers at current pace of 24000 more units/month would take 64 years, so that one doesn't seem worth mentioning at all actually)
Assuming the rate doubles it would be 4 years still for the 360 (32 for the PS3).
Stating that a year from now the Wii will still have the lead, but the gap is closing is true, but it seems like a misrepresentation of the numbers to make a story. It's far more likely we'll move onto the next generation of hardware before 8 or even 4 years are up, so the accompanying statement seems misleading. (I always worry when supposedly "non-biased results" are delivered in such a way as to create a headline)
Notably I'd guess the software sales gap is much closer and that the 360 could overtake the Wii during this generation. Software sales aren't released publicly though, so I'm not sure, but I'd expect that to be a more likely scenario (though perhaps maybe not as headline attention grabbing?)