US videogame sales slump in March
(AFP) -
AFP - US videogame sales fell 17 percent in March as the industry failed to escape the economic slowdown, according to figures released by the market research firm NPD Group.
Videogame sales dropped to 1.43 billion dollars in March from 1.72 billion dollars in the same month last year, NPD said. Videogame software and videogame hardware sales were equally affected, according to the figures released by NPD on Thursday. Videogame software sales fell 17 percent to 792.8 million dollars while videogame hardware sales declined by 18 percent to 455.5 million dollars.
Sales of videogame accessories were down 15 percent at 185.7 million dollars. Despite the drop in March, videogame sales were virtually unchanged for the quarter, NPD said, racking up 4.25 billion dollars in the first three months of 2009 compared with 4.24 billion dollars in the same quarter last year. Nintendo's Wii was the top-selling game platform in March with 601,000 units sold followed by Nintendo DS handheld console on sales of 563,000 units.
Microsoft's Xbox 360 was next on sales of 330,000 units followed by Sony's PlayStation 3 on sales of 218,000 units. Sony's PSP handheld console sold 168,000 units in March. Among game titles, Capcom USA's "Resident Evil 5" was the top-selling game in March, selling 938,000 units for the Xbox and 585,000 for the PlayStation 3. Nintendo's "Pokemon Platinum Version" was next on sales of 805,000 units followed by Microsoft's "Halo Wars" on sales of 639,000 units and Nintendo's "Wii Fit" on sales of 541,000 units.
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