Kingdom Hearts III, Resident Evil 2 can't stop January US sales dip
NPD Group finds gaming revenues down 19% year-over-year to $893 million; growth of Switch sales offset by declines in all other platforms
The US games industry saw declines in January despite a full slate of big new releases. The NPD Group today released its monthly US sales report, showing total game sales down 19% for the month to $893 million.
That decline came despite the January debuts of Kingdom Hearts III, the Resident Evil 2 remake, New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, and Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown. Last year's January haul of $1.1 billion was led by Monster Hunter World and Dragon Ball FighterZ, representing the industry's best opening sales month since 2011, but the decline was down to more than just a tough comparison against last year. January 2018's NPD reporting period covered five weeks, while last month's was four weeks long.
On the software side, sales were down 18% to $427 million. Nintendo Switch software sales grew by a double-digit percentage, while all other platforms saw declines. The top 20 best-selling games across all platforms for January follows:
- Kingdom Hearts III
- Resident Evil 2
- New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe (digital sales not included)
- Call of Duty: Black Ops IIII (PC digital sales not included)
- Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (digital sales not included)
- Red Dead Redemption II
- Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown
- NBA 2K19
- Mario Kart 8 (digital sales not included)
- Grand Theft Auto V
- Madden NFL 19 (PC digital sales not included)
- Tales of Vesperia
- The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (digital sales not included)
- Battlefield V (PC digital sales not included)
- Super Mario Party (digital sales not included)
- Minecraft (PlayStation and Xbox platforms only)
- Assassin's Creed: Odyssey
- Marvel's Spider-Man
- FIFA 19 (PC digital sales not included)
- Super Mario Odyssey (digital sales not included)
The NPD Group tracks physical sales for all platforms and digital sales for titles from a panel of a dozen participating publishers.
On the hardware side of things, sales were down 28% year-over-year to $199 million. As in software, the Nintendo Switch saw its hardware sales grow over last January's numbers, while all other platforms saw declines.