Its that time again.
The data covers the four weeks ending May 30, 2009.
Market looks down alot from last month (no DSi launch) and down from last year (no Wii Fit, GTAIV)
EA Sports Active is supposed to be at 600k worldwide sellthrough as of the May 30 week (EA specifically said this at their conference - they were quite proud of it and rightly so), it should be interesting to see where NPD puts it. If Wii is to meet or exceed our estimates its due EA Sports Active and/or Punch Out.
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Jacob Mazel
NPD will release video game sales data for the USA market covering the four weeks ending May 30, this Thursday at 6:30 PM EST. Vgchartz data for the same period of time, across the entirety of the Americas is already available. Compared to May 2008, it looks like another down month simply because of how elevated the market was then riding on the backs of Wii Fit, Grand Theft Auto IV and Mario Kart Wii.
Scaling down the Vgchartz Americas data to estimate for the United States (over the industry, 87% of all "Americas" sales come from the USA), we expect NPD to report that the six hardware systems sold roughly the following amounts in May.
| VGChartz | Wedbush | EEDAR | |
| DS | 448,000 | 440,000 | 430,000 |
| Wii | 373,000 | 300,000 | 340,000 |
| 360 | 170,000 | 140,000 | 150,000 |
| PS3 | 132,000 | 100,000 | 120,000 |
| PS2 | 122,000 | 130,000 | 111,000 |
| PSP | 103,000 | 90,000 | 100,000 |
In May 2008, NPD reported the following hardware totals for the United States market.
Wii – 675,000
DS – 453,000
PS3 – 209,000
360 – 187,000
PSP – 182,000
PS2 – 132,000
In essence, DS, PS2 and Xbox 360 will be almost flat year over year, while PS3, Wii, and PSP will be down sharply. The PS2 and Xbox 360 ‘flat’ year over year comparisons actually mean less money for Microsoft and Sony though as the systems cost less in May 2009 than May 2008. For DS, the flat sales are good news, because the DSi costs 30% more than the DS Lite, so Nintendo made more money on DS than last year. Compared to April 2009, the story doesn’t get much better.
May 2009 NPD Est April 2009 NPD Sales
Wii 373,000 340,000
PS3 132,000 127,000
360 170,000 175,000
DS 448,000 1,040,000
PSP 103,000 116,000
PS2 122,000 172,000
The DS dropped sharply from April 2009 with the launch effect of the DSi over. Nonetheless, it was still the best selling platform in May 2009. Wii saw a modest boost in May on EA Sports Active and Punch Out, climbing 10% over its April 2009 level. The PS3 and Xbox 360 also saw single digit month over month increases from April. PSP dropped about 10% though, and the PS2 dropped about 30% as its early April price cut boost had largely lost its early effectiveness by late May.
Software sales were relatively quiet for the month of May, the scaled (87%) figures for May are shown below.
| May 2009 Top Sellers | Platform | Publisher | Sales | |
| 1 | Wii Fit | Wii | Nintendo | 369,903 |
| 2 | EA Sports Active | Wii | EA | 305,999 |
| 3 | UFC 2009 Undisputed | X360 | THQ | 212,237 |
| 4 | Pokemon Platinum | DS | Nintendo | 183,668 |
| 5 | Mario Kart Wii | Wii | Nintendo | 173,202 |
| 6 | Punch Out!! | Wii | Nintendo | 156,584 |
| 7 | UFC 2009 Undisputed | PS3 | THQ | 154,309 |
| 8 | Wii Play | Wii | Nintendo | 148,244 |
| 9 | Infamous | PS3 | SCEA | 101,006 |
| 10 | X Men Origins: Wolverine U.E. | X360 | Act-Bliz | 87,357 |
| 11 | New Super Mario Brothers | DS | Nintendo | 87,098 |
| 12 | Mario Kart DS | DS | Nintendo | 76,571 |
| 13 | Sacred 2: Fallen Angel | X360 | CDV SW | 73,953 |
| 14 | Halo 3 | X360 | Microsoft | 73,829 |
| 15 | Call of Duty: World at War | X360 | Act-Bliz | 68,831 |
| 16 | X Men Origins: Wolverine U.E. | PS3 | Act-Bliz | 58,847 |
| 17 | Gardening Mama | DS | Majesco | 58,337 |
| 18 | Lego Star Wars: T.C.S. | Wii | Lucas Arts | 50,708 |
| 19 | MLB 09: The Show | PS3 | SCEA | 50,522 |
| 20 | Nintendogs | DS | Nintendo | 50,151 |
Estimating for the United States, five of the ten best selling titles for the month were on the Wii. THQ scored a big hit on PS3 and Xbox 360 with UFC 2009 Undisputed. DS software quieted back down this month as hardware sales returned to more seasonal levels, allowing four Playstation titles, all for PS3, to chart in the top twenty. Five Xbox 360 titles charted in the top twenty although most missed the top ten on low Xbox 360 sales. It seems that the Wii Fitness genre is in full swing with Wii Fit and EA Sports active taking the top two spots and both titles are expected to be in the top ten for many months to come before Wii Fit Plus and the EA Sports Active expansion pack arrive at the end of the year.
Looking ahead, June should be a relatively quiet month, although the portables usually see increased demand as kids are let out of school. In addition, the initial motion plus games and a new iteration of Guitar Hero should insure better software sales for the month compared to May. Fight Night 4, Prototype and The Conduit have a chance at breaking out as fairly big hits as well.
People are difficult to govern because they have too much knowledge.
When there are more laws, there are more criminals.
- Lao Tzu
