With September coming to an end, a new report was issued
with the work results recorded by the consoles and games makers.
Microsoft’s Xbox 360 Group PR Manager David Dennis,
explained the situation "September is typically a slow month, so even
taking the price cut into consideration, we did very well." The company
cut the prices on all of its models, making the Xbox 360 the market’s most
affordable next generation console, available for $50 less than the Wii and
about half the price of the PlayStation 3. Even so, the undisputed leader for
September is Nintendo, with sales of 687k units, which represents a powerful
boost from Augusts’ sales of 453k units.
Despite Nintendo’s apparent success, September was presented
by the NPD Group’s analyst Anita Frazier as "the first true monthly
decline the industry has experienced since March of 2006." The US sales,
which include software, hardware and accessories, added up at $1.27 billion in
September.
As the holiday season approaches, the expectations of the console
and game makers rise, being a well known fact that no matter how good or bad
the situation is, it always gets better once the holidays approach. Considering
the general holiday sales trend, NPD predicts that it will reach its target of
$22 billion revenue.
In addition to Wii’s success, Nintendo DS recorded sales of
537k units, the Xbox 360 came third with 347k and the next three positions are
taken by the PSP, the PlayStation 3 and the PlayStation 2 with 238k, 232k and
respectively 174k.
The monthly hardware revenue is down by 9 percent, reaching
in September $498.0 million. "Hardware unit sales were flat versus last
year, so the decline in dollars is due to lower prices," explained
Frazier. "The average retail price of hardware across all platforms
declined 8 percent from last September."
The software revenue also recorded a decline in overall
software revenues, mostly because there was no blockbuster released in the past
several weeks. The revenues slid from $656.5 million to $616.1 million, with
the month’s big hit being LucasArts' Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. The game
did very well, selling a total of 1.16 million units; 610k units of the 360
edition were sold, in addition to the 325k units sold for the PS3 and also 223k
units of the Wii edition.
Still, there is a newcomer that managed to cause some hype
on the market, as Electronic Arts' Mercenaries 2: World in Flames reached the
sixth place with 297k units sold. The top ten also includes MTV Games/
Electronic Arts‘ Rock Band 2, Nintendo’s Mario Cart Wii and Electronic Arts’
Madden NFL 09.
Even though NPD does not use data on PC games, Anita Frazier
addressed the matter, presenting the results recorded by two PC games released
last month: "Spore realized sales of 406,000 units and Warhammer Online:
Age of Reckoning sold 274,000, which would put them both in the top 10 list of
combined console, portable, and PC games sales for the month," she stated.
