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U.S. Video Game Sales Down 10% in May

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the stiff-upper-lip dept.

kukyfrope writes "After a strong 15.5% increase in U.S. video game sales in April 2006, May has gone the other way, posting sales numbers 10% below those of May 2005. Xbox 360 game sales and console sales alone slumped 37% and 25% respectively, but despite these declines, annual year-to-date game sales are only down 5%. Even so, analysts are not surprised, citing the transition from current-gen to next-gen systems as a dip in the market. 'We expect U.S. video game software dollar sales to decline 4% in 2006. We think that the transition is only partially complete, and believe that several bumps in the road [still] lie ahead,' said Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter."

4 of 45 comments (clear)

  1. SORRY by hurfy · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm am still playing the game i bought in April.

    I will do better next month i promise ;)

  2. I'm doing something I've never done.... by fujiman · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I'm planning out my game purchases. I have a 360, and love it, but the price of games is at the point where I'm planning out every purchase. I think I'll only do 3 to 4 games a year at this rate.

    Live Arcade is a different story, I'll probably buy a dozen of those.

    By comparison, I bought around 10 to 15 Gamecube games a year over the past few years. It's hard to imagine with cheapies like me around, how Sony and MS will make alot of money on AAA titles. I'm waiting until Oblivion goes down to 30 bucks, after shipping, new, on ebay.

  3. Discretionary Spending by Mr.Sharpy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I think we should expect to see more numbers like this in the near future, especially in entertainment sectors. Things are getting tight in peoples' budgets due to various reasons, but especially because of high energy prices. One of the first places people look to save money is in their entertainment budget (whether they think of it consciously as that or not) by cutting down on eating out, movies, music and GAMES. After that they will start to cut into other more direct quality of life areas of their budgets.

  4. Month by month? Isn't that kind of stupid? by Ahnteis · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Isn't month-by-month analysis self-defeating? I mean really, some months there just aren't many new games worth buying.
    I'd be very surprised if there WEREN'T monthly fluctuations.