Video Game Sales Down 11%

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An eleven percent slide is worrisome but, considering all of this year's biggest selling titles hit the shelves after these numbers were tallied, I think the fourth quarter will more than make up for it.

"New physical retail sales had a rough third quarter," said NPD analyst Anita Frazier in the report. "Increases in sales from some of these other monetization methods, and full game and add-on digital downloads in particular, only partially offset the decline seen in the new physical retail channel."
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It says "New Physical sales" meaning in store purchases and not on line digital purchases? The title is a bit misleading.
 
kingsleytim said:
It says "New Physical sales" meaning in store purchases and not on line digital purchases? The title is a bit misleading.
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If you read a little bit further in the original post...

"Increases in sales from some of these other monetization methods, and full game and add-on digital downloads in particular, only partially offset the decline seen in the new physical retail channel."
 
Intel_Hydralisk said:
"Increases in sales from some of these other monetization methods, and full game and add-on digital downloads in particular, only partially offset the decline seen in the new physical retail channel."
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And this is a useless statement since Valve does not publish Steam sales figures, so any uptick in digital sales numbers they have does not include anything on Steam, or in other words does not include 80% of all PC game sales. (80% is my guess)
 
It seems hard to gauge the industry without including digital sales. I rarely buy a game disc for PC anymore if I have the option of purchasing from a download service such as Steam. I do not play many games on my PS3, I use it mainly for Bluray and Netflix player. However I am looking forward to playing Uncharted 3 and Assassins Creed when I get tired of Skyrim.
 
The numbers shouldn't have been tallied until after the Christmas season / year was over.
 
The way I see it.

#1 People are focusing on games that are good, and ignoring those that are bad. Rage, which is a horribly overpriced game is nothing compared to Skyrim. So many people are probably ignoring bad games they probably usually don't ignore. Overall, game sales will decline, but more importantly good game sales still rise.

#2 Streaming services may have taken a toll on game consoles. A lot of Xbox 360's were sold on Black Friday, but what are they being used for? It could be that people bought them to use as a NetFlix box for their TV.

#3. DLC's and Steam weren't accounted for. Services like World of Warcraft, Steam, and DLC's probably don't count. Whole lot of micro-transactions. Star Wars The Old Republic was just released, and I doubt that counts in game sales.

#4 Too many good free games. Games like league of legends or other many popular online games. If people don't have money to spend, then this is likely where they ended up.
 
Way too many people are focused on PC gaming here understandably. If they counted WOW subscriptions, the numbers would go down even more considering WOW has been losing subs. F2P PC games will not dent this console dominated market. Gaming hardware is being counted in the total regardless of if they're being used for just netflix.

The bottom line is that none of the big hitters this year were released in Q3. Once they tally up BF3, Skyrim, MW3, etc. etc., Q4 will explode.
 
chinesepiratefood said:
I don't even remember the last time I bought a hard copy of a PC game. Call of Duty 2 maybe?
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Well that's because they hardly have any physical copies you can buy. Game stop has it condensed to a very tiny shelf that's not even noticeable. Walmart and other places usually have more educational titles than the mainstream ones.
 
This year, in particular, was stacked in Q4 for AAA game releases. Quarterly analysis isn't very informative for a field like video games.

Q1-3, the largest releases were probably Pokemon, GoW3, Portal 2 and maybe DXHR, although DXHR probably falls closer in line with titles like ME2/DA2/Deadspace 2.

Q4 has Just Dance 3 (seriously, I think it's the #3 sold game in 2011), Arkham City, BF3, MW3, Skyrim, Mario Kart 7, Super Mario 3D and Skyward Sword.
 
Dan_D said:
The numbers shouldn't have been tallied until after the Christmas season / year was over.
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Well, it was a comparison of Q3 numbers vs. last year, so the numbers are what they are. But I think all that says is that the Q3 releases were crap and/or people were just waiting for the kickass releases that came in Q4.
 
This year I've purchased more games than I have in years. It's been a great year to be a gamer. PC or otherwise.

Hard Reset
Dead Island
Dead Space 2
F3AR
Mortal Kombat 2011
Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition
Battlefield 3 + Back to Karkland
Star Wars: The Old Republic Collector's Edition

More I need to get:

Skyrim (Maybe)
Batman Arkham City

I've purchased more games than that this year although some of them have been onsale and are older games such as Mass Effect 1 & 2, GRID etc.
 
Diablo 3 didn't come out, I believe if it did the sales figures would have gone up instead by a considerable margin.
 
Probably because the standard price for a new game has risen 20%.

It used to be the case that the hot new releases were $50. Its standard now for them to charge $60.

Supply and demand....they wonder why sales are down?
 
Zarathustra[H];1038173833 said:
And this is a useless statement since Valve does not publish Steam sales figures, so any uptick in digital sales numbers they have does not include anything on Steam, or in other words does not include 80% of all PC game sales. (80% is my guess)
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Last time I heard, Steam said they were doing better than ever.
 
Mr34727 said:
Probably because the standard price for a new game has risen 20%.

It used to be the case that the hot new releases were $50. Its standard now for them to charge $60.

Supply and demand....they wonder why sales are down?
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New games have cost $60 since 2005.
 
Mr34727 said:
Probably because the standard price for a new game has risen 20%.

It used to be the case that the hot new releases were $50. Its standard now for them to charge $60.

Supply and demand....they wonder why sales are down?
Click to expand...

I think they were $60 since the N64 days IRC...
 
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