Even though sales of such video game systems as Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 3/2 as well as handheld Nintendo DS and Sony PlayStation Portable dropped in April, video game business in general remained on the very high level thanks to extremely popular titles like Grand Theft Auto 4 (GTA4) as well as exceptionally strong sales of Nintendo Wii console and its software, recent figures from NPD show.

Video Game Market on the Rise

“The industry continues to set a blistering sales pace, and now shows a year-to-date increase of 31% over last year’s record-setting revenues. This is the first month in many that we’ve seen a decrease in portable hardware and software sales, but it’s important to remember that this year, the Easter holiday fell in March as compared to April in 2007. April 2007 and March 2008 saw sizable games in portable in part due to the holiday timing,” said Anita Frazier, an analyst from NPD, in a statement.

The entire game market – which, includes both hardware and software – accounted for $1.23 billion in April, or 47% higher than in April, 2007. Gamers acquired over 1.2 million of non-portable game consoles and 607.5 thousand of handheld game systems for $426.2 million, up 26% from the same period last year, but down from March ‘08. Software sales totaled $654.7 million, up 68% year over year, whereas sales of video game accessories increased 39% to $154 million.

Wii Outsells All the Other Game Consoles

With 714.2 million video game systems sold in April, Nintendo Wii outsells all the other non-portable game consoles available today – Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony PlayStation 2 and Sony PlayStation 3 – combined.

“As retail supplies become more plentiful we’re seeing continued sales strength of Wii hardware. With a couple of blockbuster games already in the market this year, and with Wii Fit and Rock Band still to come in the next two months, the pipeline of content to continue to drive hardware acquisition looks very good,” Ms. Frazier said.

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Neither Microsoft, nor Sony Computer Entertainment Inc., can blame supply constraints for relatively low sales results of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360: both consoles dropped to below 50 thousand units sold through a week in April, which is rather an indicator that both consoles are overprice.

Sales of Microsoft Xbox 360 have not dropped below 200 thousand level following price-slash in August ’07, but with 188 thousand units sold-through in April, it becomes clear that the platform is losing popularity among consumers. Sony PlayStation 3 also became more popular after the price-cut in October and due to holiday season, however, even despite of Grand Theft Auto 4 and Grand Tourismo 5 Prologue releases the PlayStation 3 did not manage to beat even the Xbox 360. Sales of the PS2 also declined last month.

“It was surprising not to see bigger hardware sales for the Xbox 360 and the PS3 given the release of GTA IV. However, since the game was only in the market for 5 days during this reporting period, that sales lift could very well be evident in May data,” Ms. Frazier assumed.

It is interesting to note that sales of handheld game consoles also declined in April. According to NPD, end-users bought 414.8 thousand of Nintendo DS and 192.7 thousand of PlayStation Portable, which is significantly less compared to March, when Nintendo sold 698 thousand DSes, while Sony supplied 297 thousand of PSPs.

Grand Theft Auto 4 – Fastest Selling Title in History

“GTA IV captured two of the three top game spots, realizing an attach rate of 20% to the combined Xbox 360 and PS3 install bases. With only 5 days at retail during the reporting month, GTA IV is one of the fastest-selling titles in video games history,” the analyst from NPD said.

However, not only Take-Two’s highly-anticipated block-buster title was a huge winner in April in the U.S. Content from Nintendo and for Wii dominated the Top 10, which means that casual gamers, who acquired Wii, do buy game titles in massive quantities, something, which will not remain unnoticed by game developers.

“In a classic example of counter-programming, Mario Kart for the Wii captured the second-highest game sales for the month. It’s unusual for three games to exceed the 1-million mark in a non-holiday month which just goes to prove that great content can succeed regardless of when it is launched,” claimed Ms. Frazier.

The NPD analysts further predicted the rise of software sales for video game consoles.

“At this point in the console transition we’d expect to see a greater portion of total industry sales to come from console software sales and in fact console software sales were up 121% accounting for 44% of total industry revenues,” Ms. Frazier explained.

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