NPD Group Releases March Sales Figures

Leading market research firm NPD Group today released U.S. game industry sales information for the period of March 4 to April 7, showing industry-wide growth over the same period last year. Software sales totaled $574 million, a 15 percent increase over sales in March 2006, while hardware sales jumped 69 percent to $370 million. Overall, industry sales in the U.S., including software, hardware and accessories, climbed 33 percent from last year, totaling $1.1 billion.

Continuing its reign at the top of the hardware charts was the Nintendo DS with 508,000 units sold during the month of March. Coming in at a distant second place was the ever-popular PS2, which sold 280,000 systems throughout the month, proving that unlike the competition, Sony isn’t quite ready to abandon the last generation. The Wii was next in line with 259,000 systems sold, followed by the Xbox 360 (199,000), the PSP (180,000), and the Game Boy Advance (148,000). Sony’s PlayStation 3 brought up the rear last month with just 130,000 units sold in the U.S.

Software sales showed a significant increase, as well, thanks in no small part to a trio of highly-anticipated titles on the PS2 and Xbox 360. God of War 2 was widely accepted as the jewel of the month by both critics and consumers, selling 833,000 copies despite shipping more than a week into the tracking period. No other title came close to matching the success of Kratos’ second adventure, a couple of big titles on the Xbox 360 helped propel Microsoft to a respectable month. Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 was the runner-up last month with 394,000 copies sold, followed by the Xbox 360 release of Guitar Hero 2, which sold 291,000 copies since its release despite its hefty price tag and controversial downloadable content pricing.

Top 10 games for March, 2007, based on number of units sold:
1. God of War II–PS2–833,000
2. Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2–Xbox 360–394,000
3. Guitar Hero 2–Xbox 360–291,000
4. Wii Play with Wii Remote–Wii–273,000
5. MotorStorm–PS3–199,000
6. Diddy Kong Racing–Nintendo DS–189,000
7. Spectrobes–Nintendo DS–165,000
8. MLB 2K7–Xbox 360–165,000
9. MLB ’07: The Show–PS2–164,000
10. Def Jam Icon–Xbox 360–148,000