Report: U.S. Game Sales Up 1%; Sony PS3 Leads for First Time

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 20, 2009 - 7:43am.

Port Washington, N.Y. - Sony's (NYSE: SNE) PlayStation 3 for the first time ever led U.S. video game sales in September, which on the whole rose 1% from a year ago after several months of decline, according to sales figures compiled by market research firm NPD Group. Overall sales were $1.28 billion in September; despite Sony's success, game hardware sales fell 6% from a year ago, to $472 million.

While Nintendo's DS handheld led all hardware sales with 524, 200 units, the PlayStation 3 led among consoles with sales of 491,800 units; Nintendo sold 462,800 Wiis and Microsoft (NASD: MSFT) sold 352,600 Xbox 360s.

"Compared to last September, the PS3 was the big winner, more than doubling last year's sales," said NPD analyst Anita Frazier.

"This portrays a very strong consumer reaction to the price decrease as August and September both realized a lift of more than 70% over the prior month. This is the first month that the PS3 has captured the top spot in console hardware sales."

Overall game sales were up 5% last month from a year ago, to $649.3 million.

September's top-selling game was Microsoft's "Halo 3: ODST" (1,520,000 units).

Also placing in the top ten were Electronic Arts' (NASD: ERTS) "Madden NFL 10," MTV Games (NYSE: VIA)/Electronic Arts' "The Beatles: Rock Band," and Activision's (NASD: ATVI) "Guitar Hero 5."

Related Links:
http://www.npd.com

Published in DMW Daily, October 20, 2009

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Comments

SHOCKING!...wait...no.

Submitted by Denny12321 (not verified) on October 20, 2009 - 10:58am.

I can't believe how well the PS3 is performing in sales lately. I thought Sony was toast this generation. Then again, anything is possible with big enough price cuts. Wii and 360 both have more to offer per dollar than PS3.