The delayed NPD results for the month of May are finally here, and while the consensus from analysts seemed to be that software sales would be up as much as 10% or more, software totals only climbed 4%, and the industry as a whole dipped 5%. Software came in at $466.3 million while hardware dipped down by 20% to $241.5 million. Accessories were up 3% to $115.7 million. All in all, the industry totaled $823.5 million in May, and through May it's tracking 10% behind 2009's figures.
It wasn't quite as bad as we think though. NPD analyst Anita Frazier put things in perspective: "Although down this month, May sales reflect the third best-selling May on record after May '08 and May '09." Frazier also noted that portable declines contributed the most to the sales slump, as did lower average selling prices on consoles.
Hardware really took a hit in May. The DS had a precipitous decline in April, falling to 440.8K units sold, but in May it fell to 383.7K units, and it was still the top selling system for the month. The Wii posted sales of 334.8K units, up slightly from the previous month as hardware allocations at retail likely improved somewhat. After the Wii, the Xbox 360 edged out PS3, 194.6K units versus 154.5K units. The PSP rounded out the pack with a meager 59.4K units sold.
On the software side, the two biggest games, as expected, were Rockstar's Red Dead Redemption and Nintendo's Super Mario Galaxy 2. The PS3 and 360 versions combined for over 1.5 million sold. Meanwhile, Galaxy 2 sold through 563.9K units on the Wii. Notably, Alan Wake on Xbox 360 managed to crack the top 10 at number eight, but NPD didn't reveal the exact unit sales.
Here's the complete top 10 list for May:
5 Comments
July 1, 2010
Alan Wake :(
July 1, 2010
New Super Mario Bros Wii is unstoppable! =D
July 1, 2010
These numbers show retail sales don't match online sales, that's for sure...perhaps they are correct, but something seems really strange with UFC 2010 on both consoles and Skate 3 on the 360 making the "Top 10".
July 2, 2010
Well unless the UK market buy 700,000+ units of Alan Wake in the first month I fear for the future of this franchise.
July 5, 2010
It's sad that for all the hype behind Alan Wake, it ultimately did Too Human numbers, placing eighth (which TH did) and selling fewer than 190k units (TH did 168,200 copies its first month). Considering the long development time and Remedy indicating they bet the farm on AW, both the developer and the franchise are in serious jeopardy.