ZOMG! Scream! Panic!
The NPD Group has released its figures for July console and handheld hardware sales in North America. In short: Hardware sales were down 37 percent year-on-year (from $448 million to $281 million). The Wii saw the biggest fall, the Xbox 360 saw the smallest. Software fell by 26% ($592m to $437 million).
NPD's spokeslady, Anita Frazer says, "The U.S. video games industry declined for the fifth consecutive month, bringing year-to-date sales to $8.16 billion, down 14% from the same time period last year."
She's not all doom and gloom though, "While year-to-date results are weak, there are some big titles set to be released over the next several months, including Madden this month, which should help spur sales... looking beyond August we have The Beatles: Rock Band, Halo 3: ODST, and of course, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 to look forward to."
That, of course, is all well and good if you're MTV Games/EA, Microsoft, Activision Blizzard or a concerned onlooker with no financial stake in games who wants to feel warm and fuzzy about the industry's success. What about all the publishers that aren't MTV Games/EA, Microsoft or Activision Blizzard though?
Let's hope that Beatles proves to be a system seller.
The hard data is below. July 2008's figures are in (). And just because we can, Michael Pachter's prediction for July hardware sales are in [].
Console
Wii - 252.5k (453k) [305k]
Xbox 360 - 202.9k (195.2k) [190k]
PlayStation 3 - 121.8k (185.4k) [135k]
PlayStation 2 - 108K (144.1k)[130k]
Handheld
Nintendo DS - 538.9k (518.3k) [590k]
PSP - 122.8k (253k) [140k]
NPD's spokeslady, Anita Frazer says, "The U.S. video games industry declined for the fifth consecutive month, bringing year-to-date sales to $8.16 billion, down 14% from the same time period last year."
She's not all doom and gloom though, "While year-to-date results are weak, there are some big titles set to be released over the next several months, including Madden this month, which should help spur sales... looking beyond August we have The Beatles: Rock Band, Halo 3: ODST, and of course, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 to look forward to."
That, of course, is all well and good if you're MTV Games/EA, Microsoft, Activision Blizzard or a concerned onlooker with no financial stake in games who wants to feel warm and fuzzy about the industry's success. What about all the publishers that aren't MTV Games/EA, Microsoft or Activision Blizzard though?
Let's hope that Beatles proves to be a system seller.
The hard data is below. July 2008's figures are in (). And just because we can, Michael Pachter's prediction for July hardware sales are in [].
Console
Wii - 252.5k (453k) [305k]
Xbox 360 - 202.9k (195.2k) [190k]
PlayStation 3 - 121.8k (185.4k) [135k]
PlayStation 2 - 108K (144.1k)[130k]
Handheld
Nintendo DS - 538.9k (518.3k) [590k]
PSP - 122.8k (253k) [140k]
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