Game sales dip but PS5 drives console market up 60% | European Monthly Charts

Europe posted a solid month for video game sales during November, driven by Call of Duty, EA Sports FC 24 and PS5.

24.6 million video games were sold across tracked European markets, a rise of 20% over the year before. However, this is because November 2023 was a 'five week' month compared with the four weeks of November 2022. If we just look at the same four week period, sales were actually down slightly by 2%.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was the big driver of sales. It was the only real new release of note for the month, and made up for the absence of other AAA titles (last year saw the release of God of War Ragnarök and Pokémon Scarlet and Violet). Last year's Call of Duty (Modern Warfare 2) launched in October, so it was a significantly bigger November for COD this year than last year.

However, for its first four weeks, Modern Warfare 3's sales were 33% down compared with Modern Warfare 2. This year's title was similar to last year's release, which may have impacted interest. It was still comfortably the best-selling game of the month.

Elsewhere, EA Sports FC 24 sold 3% additional units over November compared with FIFA 23 (for the same five-week period). The game was discounted heavily over the Black Friday period.

Sticking with football, the second biggest new game of the month was Football Manager 2024, which sits at No.10. The game narrowly sold a little less than last year's title for its first four weeks on sale.

The other new game in the chart is Super Mario RPG on Switch, which makes No.13. Nintendo doesn't share digital data, so it may have charted higher if download figures were available.

For its first three weeks on sale, the SNES remake sold 13% fewer units than 2020's Paper Mario: The Origami King (which is also a Mario RPG). Of course, Super Mario RPG had competition from this Christmas' big Mario game, Super Mario Bros Wonder, which continues to sell very well at No.4. In fact, Wonder's sales only dropped 15% compared with October, which was when the title came out.

November also saw the release of Hogwarts Legacy on Switch. The game also received discounts over Black Friday on the other platforms, and as a result sales surged 509% month-on-month. The Switch version accounted for over half of the game's November sales. The Warner Bros game seems destined to end 2023 as the second biggest game of the year behind EA Sports FC 24.

In terms of Black Friday, 7.8 million games were sold that week, a slight drop of 1% over the same period in 2022. EA Sports FC 24 was comfortably the best-selling title of Black Friday, followed by Call of Duty and Hogwarts Legacy.

Over in console, and 1.3 million units of hardware were sold across tracked markets. If we just look at the same four week period as last year, sales are up 59% year-on-year.

This was entirely driven by PS5, which was in stock over the popular Black Friday period for the first time since it launched in 2020. PS5 sales are up 376% over the year before, and was comfortably the biggest console of the month. Nintendo Switch is the second biggest, but sales are down 35% over last November. Xbox Series S and X is in third position, with sales down 26% over the year before.

Console data does not include all markets and is missing Germany and the UK. For UK data, click here.

Over in accessories, and 2.56 million units of peripherals were sold over November. In terms of the same four-week period in 2022, sales are up 13.8%.

Controllers continue to dominate, driven by the PS5 DualSense which saw a big spike in sales thanks to the performance of PS5 overall. The new Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Amiibo debut at No.7 and No.9, while the PlayStation Portal accessory comes in at No.8.

European GSD November 2023 Top 10 (Digital + Physical)

*Digital data unavailable

GSD digital data includes games from participating companies sold via Steam, Xbox Live, PlayStation Network, Nintendo Eshop. Major participating companies are Activision Blizzard, Bandai Namco, Capcom, Codemasters, Electronic Arts, Embracer Group (including Gearbox, Koch Media, Sabre Interactive), Focus Entertainment, Konami, Marvellous Games, Microids, Microsoft (including Bethesda), Milestone, Nacon, Paradox Interactive, Quantic Dream, Sega, Sony, Square Enix, Take-Two, Ubisoft and Warner Bros. Nintendo and 505 Games are the notable absentees, alongside smaller studios.

Digital data includes games sold in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, and United Kingdom.

Physical data includes all games, but only those sold in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom.

Console hardware sales cover Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. Accessories sales cover the same markets, but doesn't include Switzerland.