Whoever says video games aren’t selling as well as they used to lately isn’t looking at all the numbers.
A report from the NPD Group shows that $3.45 billion was spent on video game content in the United States during the third quarter of this year, a 17 percent increase over the previous year’s numbers. That includes physical retail games, as well as digital full games and downloadable content across various platforms. As a result, the games industry shows the largest growth amongst other industries since the second quarter of 2011.
Breaking down the numbers, $1.3 billion was spent on physical video and PC releases, while $436 million was spent on other forms of physical content, mainly used and rental purchases. The remaining $1.72 billion was generated by digital sales, which included mobile content, subscriptions, DLC and virtual item sales. The digital sales total is now significantly larger than physical retail sales in the US.
“Trends during the third quarter were the best that we have observed since the second quarter of 2011, driven by growth across both the physical and digital sides of the video game industry,” said Liam Callahan, industry analyst. “The launch of Grand Theft Auto V helped propel the new physical sales by twenty percent and continued growth of console digital full games as well as downloadable add-on content is an indication of the renewed health of the industry. We expect that the launches of Microsoft’s Xbox One and the Sony PS4 will continue to fuel consumer excitement and spending for games heading into the holiday season.”
Source: NPD
