SuperData released its top digital games data for February 2013, which we’re publishing on [a]list daily as the first of a monthly column. Joost van Dreunen, co-founder and CEO of SuperData, provided insight for this month’s report.
“In February, the total digital games category grew 8.8 percent compared the same month last year, and reached $850.1 million in total sales. Month-over-month February showed a decline of 11 percent for the entire segment, as DLC taper off after the post-holiday,” noted van Dreunen. “Year-over-year digital sales for the month of February increased $69 million from $781 million in 2012 for the entire sector.”
SuperData’s report shows that the social game market continued to weaken, even as Zynga regained its leadership position on Facebook. Free-to-play MMOs saw an increase in revenue due to increasing conversion rate, while pay-to-play MMOs fell drastically especially when looking at the trailing twelve months since February 2012. The report noted that World of Warcraft continues to bleed users.
“The mobile games segment grew as spending breached the $11 threshold. In February the average revenue per paying user across all categories was $11.13. The sector shows continued momentum, and we expect this to last through March before tapering off in the early Spring,” noted van Dreunen. “Newcomer among the top three grossing titles was Simpsons: Tapped Out (EA Mobile), which replaced Rage of Bahamut (Mobage).”
“With the dust settling after the 2012 holiday spending, the DLC segment returned to normal spending levels at $312 million in February, up from $232 million a year ago. Consistent with Electronic Arts’ focus on the digital download, the publisher dominated the market this month with two of its titles Dead Space 3 and Crysis 3 among the top,” he concluded.
