The NPD Group has released the video game sales numbers for March 2016, and while it showed some decrease over last year, there were still plenty of highlights—especially for those who enjoy Ubisoft’s latest release, Tom Clancy’s The Division.
Total video game sales for the month reached $964.1 million, which is a slight drop-off from last year’s $968.4 million. However, physical software saw a huge jump to $425.8 million, an eight percent increase from 2015’s $395.4 million.
Part of that success was due to The Division, which released in the earlier part of the month and became March’s most successful title. Ubisoft also took the second-place spot with its first-person adventure Far Cry: Primal, while Nintendo’s The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD remake took third. Rounding out the top five are Grand Theft Auto V and EA Sports UFC 2.
The NPD Group’s Liam Callahan provided plenty of other insight from the report:
“Tom Clancy’s The Division had the best launch month for any Tom Clancy title to date, having sold 40 percent more than the next best-selling Tom Clancy title, March 2008’s Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 (when adjusted for number of days sold within the month).”
He added, “Stemming from strong launches of Tom Clancy’s The Division and Far Cry: Primal, Ubisoft is the number-one software publisher for Q1 2016, with a unit sales increase close to 130 percent, and a dollar sales increase of over 200 percent.”
Callahan also noted a 36 percent growth in software unit sales for consoles like the Xbox One and PlayStation 4. He also points out the popularity of both accessories and digital cards.
“On a dollar basis, March 2016 video game accessory sales rose by nine percent over March 2015, making March 2016 the highest-selling March on record for video game accessory sales.
Three types of accessories continue to propel overall accessory sales in 2016: Video Game Cards, Gamepads and Headsets/Headphones; all experienced double-digit growth in March 2016 vs. March 2015, and have sold $82 M more in Q1 ’16 versus Q1 ’15,” he added. “March 2016 marked the best March on record for Video Game Cards for both units and dollars, exceeding last March (the second-best March ever) by 20 percent in units and 16 percent in dollars.”
Callahan noted that, as a whole, “Combined sales across hardware, physical software and accessories in March 2016 were flat to last March as growth in physical software and accessories offset the 19 percent decline in hardware sales.”
Although March numbers were flat, sales are likely to see a rise over the next couple of months, with big titles like Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, Doom and Mirror’s Edge Catalyst set to arrive in May.
