On Thursday, The NPD Group, released the official video game hardware and software sales for the month of June 2009 and, as usual, Nintendo dominated the charts.
First, let’s take a quick look at the June 2009 hardware sales provided by NPD:
1. Nintendo DS – 766,500
2. Wii – 361,700
3. Xbox 360 – 240,600
4. PlayStation 3 – 164,700
5. PSP – 163,500
6. PlayStation 2 – 152,700
It seems that while all three of the major home consoles (PS3, Wii, and Xbox 360) saw sales improvements over May 2009 and the 360 saw sales improvement over last June, overall hardware sales are actually down by 38 percent year-over-year. Yikes. And, while this doesn’t exactly fare well for an industry that is already being crippled by the effects of the recession, Nintendo still seems to be holding strong with its portable platforms, the Nintendo DS and the relatively recently released DSi which brought in a whopping 766,500 units this month. To put that in perspective, that’s more than the sum total sales of all other major consoles this month, combined.
Honestly though, the sales figure I find extremely unsettling is the narrow gap between PS3 and PS2 sales with only a 12,000 unit difference. I realize that Sony is sticking to their ground about not dropping the price of their PS3 system and I’m sure that they’re figuring the new Killzone 2 + MGS4 and WALL-E Bluray + LittleBigPlanet will help boost sales in July but if that doesn’t push sales enough, perhaps we’ll see that heavily-rumored early August PS3 price drop (Just in time for Madden). Sony can’t have their last-gen system matching sales of their current-generation hardware!
Onto the software sales:
1. Prototype (Activision, 360) 419,900
2. UFC 2009: Undisputed (THQ, 360) 338,300
3. EA Sports Active (EA, Wii) 289,100
4. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10* (EA, Wii) 272,400
5. Wii Fit (Nintendo, Wii) 271,600
6. Fight Night Round 4 (EA, 360) 260,800
7. Fight Night Round 4 (EA, PS3) 210,300
8. Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo, Wii) 202,100
9. Red Faction: Guerrilla (THQ, 360) 199,400
10. Infamous (Sony Computer Entertainment, PS3) 192,700
*Includes MotionPlus bundle
It looks as though one third-party understand what makes Wii games successful. EA’s Oprah-friendly fitness game, EA Sports Active sold a solid 289,100 and just below that figure in the 4th place spot was their Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 at a strong opening sales figure of 272,400 units (a little over a quarter of a million, wow). Of course, one has to be curious as to how many of those Tiger Woods were bundled with the MotionPlus, creating an early 1:1 motion control start that will no doubt be catapulted by the launch of Wii Sports Resort next week.
Thankfully though, all three of June’s high-quality next-gen open world games, Prototype, Red Faction: Guerilla and Infamous found spots in the Top 10 too with Prototype on 360 securing the month’s top software sales spot and Red Faction: Guerilla on 360 and PS3-exclusive Infamous landing in the 9th and 10th sales spots, respectively. Of course, we still have some old stand-bys on the list too with Wii Fit and Mario Kart Wii still securing Top 10 spots years after launch alongside last month’s top seller UFC 2009 on 360 and EA’s new Fight Night on both PS3 and 360 rounding out the Top 10.
Notably missing from this month’s Top 10 however are Ghostbusters, which placed 11th, and Wii Play which has finally been bumped from the Top 10 after an epic 29 month streak on the chart. Oh and where’s The Conduit, Sega and High Voltage Software’s highly-marketed “killer Wii FPS”? It didn’t even land a spot in the Top 10 and sold 71,913 units according to NPD. Granted the game only had a little over a week on sale in June and sold better than Sega’s previous “hardcore” Wii outing, Mad World, but those numbers are still quite low. Perhaps, the mixed review scores from many of the leading game review outlets hampered sales.
Until next month! My prediction? I’d be willing to bet that Wii Sports Resort will take the top sales spot and NCAA Football 10 for 360 will land a place in the Top 10 as well.
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