Monthly sales reports show the slipping strength of the retail marketplace for game sales, a trend that shows itself during some months more than others. During this March, the trend was more obvious. According to market research firm NPD, sales of video and computer games plummeted 16 percent last month, to $735.4 million, compared with $875.7 million in March 2010. Sony was a significant factor in the equation: In 2010, Sony raked in about $60 million in profits from God of War III, a blockbuster the company lacked last month.
Although the launch of Nintendo’s 3DS portable game system helped drive hardware sales up 12 percent to $494.5 million, it wasn’t enough to compensate for the net loss in software sales. Further underscoring consumer cautiousness, the research also showed consumers typically purchased just one game for the $250 device. In total, game industry sales were $1.53 billion in March, down 4 percent from $1.58 billion in March 2010.
If there is a bright side for the industry as a whole, it is the continuing shift of consumer dollars into apps, social games and digital downloadable games for consoles. “The trends we’ve measured with regard to growth in digital formats like full game and add-on downloads, microtransactions, mobile apps and social network gaming will likely result in net industry growth when we release our full measure of the first quarter consumer spending on games in June,” said Anita Frazier, NPD’s game analyst.
[Source: Los Angeles Times]
