What a difference a couple of years make...The video game industry has been on a tear of late and there is no reason to think that will change anytime soon as more highly coveted titles, including the much anticipated release of the new Grand Theft Auto series drops in a couple of weeks. NPD Group, which tracks the video game category reported a blow out out month for gaming software companies as well as sales of console systems, led again by Nintendo's Wii. All told, sales of video game titles soared 63% in March on a year over year basis to nearly $1.0 billion. Much of the gain came from the release of the new Super Smash Bros. title, "Brawl" which sold nearly three million units during the month. Sales of Wii systems in March reached 700,000+ more than the combined sales of Xbox 360 systems and PS3 systems. Based on all of our tween, teen and college gaming research data, the Wii continues to be the console of choice for the youth market and again will more than likely end up in the top position on this year's Holiday Gift Wish List Report. It's just absolutely amazing what the Wii has done so far. I'd even go as far to say what the iPod did to the digital music industry, the Wii is having the same effect on the gaming category, it's just out of this world. For Nintendo, not to be outdone by sales of its category leading Wii system, also registered a healthy up tick in sales of the DS portable system which grew to nearly 700,000 units, up from under 600,000 the prior month. We've seen DS be especially popular among tween girls, ages 8 to 11, which represents a demographic that's relatively new to the category overall. As the release date of Grand Theft Auto IV draws closer, I think it is pretty safe to go out on a very sturdy limb and say they'll sell more than 2.0 million copies by the end of this calendar year and will certainly be one of the top three titles for the year. I'm sure the consumer watchdog groups will love to hear that. On that note, Happy Friday!
The Nintendo Wii is still selling like hot cakes. I've just got the Black edition and I love it.
Posted by: Sudoku Puzzles | December 30, 2009 at 12:40 PM