Video Game Sales Plunge 42% In April

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Video game sales were down 42% in April and, as unbelievable as this may seem, not once was piracy mentioned in this article. :D

Video game sales took a nose dive in April, plunging a stomach-churning 42% compared with a year earlier as companies cranked out fewer releases than in April 2011. Retailers rang up only $292.1 million in game sales last month, down from $503.2 million a year earlier, according to NPD Group, a market research firm.
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Do they really do these month-by-month? Seems really unreliable because it all depends on what games were released and when. I'm actually surprised though, because D3 is around the corner. I know i pre-ordered in april.
 
chockomonkey said:
Do they really do these month-by-month? Seems really unreliable because it all depends on what games were released and when. I'm actually surprised though, because D3 is around the corner. I know i pre-ordered in april.
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No kidding. Next month after Diablo 3 and Max Payne 3: "Video Game Sales SOAR A BAJILLION PERCENT!!!111"
 
We need to outlaw doing things other than gaming, it is killing the industry.
 
Clearly none of you are the intended target audience. You use your brain too much.
 
chockomonkey said:
Do they really do these month-by-month? Seems really unreliable because it all depends on what games were released and when. I'm actually surprised though, because D3 is around the corner. I know i pre-ordered in april.
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I'm honestly surprised they don't do a day-by-day comparison.
 
Do people not even read the synopsis anymore? It says "compared with a year earlier" in the first sentence. *shakes head*
 
dagamer34 said:
Do people not even read the synopsis anymore? It says "compared with a year earlier" in the first sentence. *shakes head*
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do you not understand anything thats happening in this thread right now? *shakes head*
 
dagamer34 said:
Do people not even read the synopsis anymore? It says "compared with a year earlier" in the first sentence. *shakes head*
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It's still not a very clear data set comparison in the article. It doesn't mention major game releases in the previous month/year as compared to the current month/year. Or really, any game release numbers at all.

Though I will at least recognize that the article mentions that game releases are probably the main cause for the fall in numbers.
 
April...Hmm, I can't think of anything that even got released this month I could give a flying f#@k about.
 
it's piracy that's killing the game industry.

*nods*
 
"Retailers rang up only $292.1 million in game sales last month"

..."sales of used games, digital game downloads and online game subscriptions contributed an additional $370 million, kicking the industry's total for the month to $1 billion."

Sounds like digital distribution is doing quite well. The return of the PC perhaps?
 
You may ignore April as one month, but isn't this the 3rd or 4th month in a row this has been the trend? Also, 42% is pretty significant. It would be one thing for revenues to be down 10 or 20%, but this is a much bigger difference. It seems like there aren't as many new games coming out this spring and I wonder if the age of these consoles can be to blame also. That coupled with increasing digital distribution on Steam, Origin, and dont forget XBOX Live and the PSN might have something to do with it. I would point a lot of it at the aged consoles.
 
The proper solution to this issue is more DRM and higher prices. BTW, I work as a video game publisher.
 
During this last month I remember mostly paying for Kickstarter projects.
But I guess publishers don't care about that.
 
bigdogchris said:
The proper solution to this issue is more DRM and higher prices. BTW, I work as a video game publisher.
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Someone get this man a corner office.

I got shafted twice in the last year - $60 for BF3 and $60 for ME3. Never again.
 
I have a hunch movie ticket sales will be down this weekend.

Hint: Its because the avengers were released last week.
 
#1 Diablo 3 soon. Very soon. It's killing a lot of games, including Blizzards own World of Warcraft.
#2 Other then Diablo 3 nothing worth a damn was released.
#3 If it isn't Diablo 3 then people are busy with Skyrim.
#4 Everyone broke. I know a lot of local business have been dead since Christmas of last year. People bought stuff they couldn't afford.
#5 People got spoiled with games like Skyrim and Portal 2, and don't want crapware games, which is like 99.99% of games released.
 
I can't name a single release from this year, beyond Mass Effect 3. I can't even tell you for sure if that came out late last year or this year, because I didn't care.
 
Considering that April was more or less devoid of any major releases it's hardly surprising.
 
I'm just amazed that people still play games that aren't Minecraft. How is that even possible? :confused:

This message was sent from my iPhone that I built in Minecraft
 
MAY: VIDEO GAME SALES UP 1000000%

Seriously. I probably added five games to my Steam wishlist that are going to be released in May. I'm fairly confident in my prediction, well, except that apparently Steam or digital sales aren't being accounted for in these numbers? :\

"Simply stated, there were notably fewer" new game releases, said NPD analyst Anita Frazier.
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At least that was acknowledged.
 
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