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January Game Sales Explode, Wii Dominates

Posted by Zonk on from the wii're-in-the-money dept.

njkid1, as he does from time to time, passed us a link to a story on the GameDaily site. Today they're discussing the January NPD numbers for the games industry. In short, they're terrific. Software sales totaled $549 million for the month, up a staggering 53 percent over last year. Hardware sales were brisk as well, with the Wii selling around 436,000 units. Trailing behind were Microsoft and Sony, with 360 hitting 294,000 units sold and the PS3 selling 244,000 units. January had an extra week, which resulted in 'inflated' sales, but even after normalizing the data things were tremendous for the games industry in a month where there's normally a post-holiday slump.

3 of 478 comments (clear)

  1. Hopefully... by KenshoDude · · Score: 5, Interesting

    With the Wii's success, one could only hope that developers will start paying more attention to gameplay innovation rather than graphical innovation. I think the success of Nintendo's new console underscores a revolution that has been waiting to take place in the gaming industry: an emphasis on playability and fun over impressive visuals. Now, if we could just combine next-gen visuals with next-gen gameplay -- a gamers' nirvana!

  2. The most telling number by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting
    The most interesting number to me in this report is that the Wii beat out the real 800 pound gorilla, Sony's PS2. While I've been a proponent of not calling off the console race until after the next holiday season, I'm surprised that the Wii is already outselling the PS2. If they keep this up over the next couple of months, I'll be ready to declare the Wii the winner and champion of this round of console sales. Sony has yet to move more PS3s off the shelves than PS2s for a single month. Not even the XBOX 360 has managed to outsell the PS2 on a regular basis despite being out for over a year and having what now amounts to a good catalog of games.

    February's numbers should be interesting.

  3. They're dominating even more in Japan by FleaPlus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    From Kotaku:

    http://kotaku.com/gaming/nintendo/hardware-wars-ds -wii-continue-to-print-yen-237481.php

    Here are the current hardware sales in the land of the rising sun for the week of February 4th to the 11th.

            * Nintendo DS Lite - 201,177
            * Wii - 78,550
            * PSP - 32,175
            * PLAYSTATION 3 - 23,431
            * PlayStation 2 - 16,033
            * Xbox 360 - 4,811
            * Game Boy Advance SP - 980
            * Game Boy micro - 884

    I rather like the comment which noted the following:

    Wii Sales > PSP sales + PS3 sales + PS2 sales + 360 sales + GBA sales + Micro sales

    DS Sales > Wii Sales + PSP sales + PS3 sales + PS2 sales + 360 sales + GBA sales + Micro sales