Forecasting and Analyzing Digital Entertainment, LLC (FADE) - a newcomer to the research scene it seems - is trying to paint a clearer picture of the downloads market, where little information is typically available. Today, the firm released a new report on the Xbox Live Arcade marketplace, which FADE says generated $103.4 million in 2009, which is a 34% increase year-over-year.
The average price of XBLA titles continues to increase, FADE found. The report noted that the average price moved up from $8.33 in 2008 to $9.12 in 2009. You can see this increase reflected in the top 10 list by revenue (below), with half of the titles featured at or near the $15 price point. EA's Battlefield 1943 was the top seller on XBLA with over 800,000 copies in the year, generating $12.5 million.
FADE also found that XBLA was particularly front-loaded in 2009 thanks to "incredible sales numbers among 'Summer of Arcade' titles" such as Trials HD, Shadow Complex, and Marvel vs. Capcom. Also, 2008's summer hit from Behemoth, Castle Crashers, continued to do well in 2009, selling an estimated 485,000 copies during the year, bringing its sales to just under 1,000,000 units sold in total.
Looking at 2010, FADE thinks XBLA will continue to see "strong growth," in part driven by the upcoming Natal launch. Natal is expected to "drive new types of Arcade games into gamers' homes, and additional hardware into homes."
Estimated Top Titles by Revenue, 2009 (Average Price):
- Battlefield 1943 (EA Dice) - $12.5 million ($15.00)
- Castle Crashers (The Behemoth) - $7.3 million ($15.00)
- Trials HD (RedLynx, LTD) - $7.1 million ($15.00)
- Shadow Complex (Chair Entertainment / Epic Games) - $6.1 million ($14.38)
- Family Game Night (Hasbro) - $4.2 million ($9.53)
- Marvel vs. Capcom 2 (Capcom) - $4.2 million ($15.00)
- Magic: The Gathering (Stainless Games) - $2.8 million ($10.00)
- Worms 2 (Team 17) - $1.8 million ($10.00)
- Peggle (PopCap Games) - $1.8 million ($8.86)
- Turtles in Time: Reshelled (Ubisoft Singapore) - $1.7 million ($10.00)
3 Comments
7 months ago
"Forecasting and Analyzing Digital Entertainment, LLC (FADE) - a newcomer to the research scene it seems"- these are basically VGChartz in disguise, they share the same server, so I'd take these figures with a hefty pinch of salt, along with any other press releases from them. An admin on the VGChartz forum has stated that they'll soon start producing Steam sales figures, apparently after developing technology that allows them to poll 5 million Steam users. Laughable.
7 months ago
ManOfSteel, I'd heard from someone within the industry that although their other data may be suspect, this particular info on XBL was reliable. That said, we're going to take a cautious approach to anything they produce, because of the vgchartz association, that's for sure.
7 months ago
Fair enough. It just struck me as odd that this report was referenced on the VGChartz website by stating that you were the source, yet the text used isn't what you've written above and there's no mention that it's essentially a VGChartz report- http://news.vgchartz.com/news.php?id=6935
Hardly inspires confidence,
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