Nintendo: We Are Responsible For 99% Of Game Industry Growth In 2008

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Nintendo Says Its Responsible For 99% Of Game Industry Growth In 2008

By Michael McWhertor, 4:20 PM on Fri Jan 16 2009

As has already been established, Nintendo is doing well for itself, shattering sales records in the United States with the Wii and Nintendo DS. And, according to Nintendo, it's 99% responsible for the industry's growth.

Nintendo highlighted that fact in its response to NPD sales data released yesterday, showing that Nintendo hardware sold more than 20 million units in the U.S. last year, with 132 million software units sold on the company's platforms. That's a considerable increase from the nearly 15 million consoles and portables it sold in 2007.

That increase in sales, Nintendo says, is 99% of the reason the video game industry saw revenues increase by $3.35 billion last year. That's a much smaller change than the game industry experienced from 2006 to 2007, we should note, 43% to 19% growth comparitively.

(The company included a handy — but visually ugly — pie chart to drive the point home, one that we tried to improve upon.)

With four of the best selling games in the U.S., according to the NPD Group, and the best-selling hardware by a large margin, we'd think it's pretty safe to say Nintendo is protecting the video game industry from succumbing to a terrible economy.

Will it be able to stave off an even worse 2009?