Wii and DS lead hardware sales, industry up 73% from the same period last year.
After much ado about withholding data from the public, the NPD Group has decided to continue its monthly practice of releasing hardware and software sales figures. For the four-week period that made up the October reporting period, here is data for hardware sold.
October 2007 Hardware Sales
Wii - 519k
Nintendo DS - 458k
Xbox 360 - 366k
PSP - 286k
PlayStation 2 - 184k
PlayStation 3 – 121k
The Wii is once again back up on top of the charts, selling through around 130,000 units a week. Nintendo has reclaimed the pole position after the Xbox 360 took the September leg with the launch of Halo 3.
Speaking of Halo 3, here are the software sales charts for the same four-week October period.
October 2007 Top Ten Software Sales
Halo 3 (Xbox 360) – 433,800
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Bundle (Xbox 360) – 383,200
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Bundle (Wii) – 286,300
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Bundle (PS2) – 271,100
Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (DS) – 262,800
Wii Play w/Remote – (Wii) – 239,700
The Orange Box (Xbox 360) – 238,400
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (Game Only) (PS2) – 231,700
FIFA Soccer 08 (PS2) – 129,700
Brain Age 2: More Training in Minutes a Day (DS) – 116,900
Microsoft's juggernaut is still top of the charts, but only by technicality. In reality, the big winner of October's software race was Activision, which sold 1.4 million copies of Guitar Hero III across all platforms in a mere six days. The Wii version did quite well for itself, especially considering it was only available in a bundle. Wii Play is still on the charts and still selling over 200k a month, and two other Nintendo titles are sticking around in the top ten.
Because of games like Guitar Hero and the continued explosive sales of current hardware, the video game industry as a whole took in $1.1 billion in sales this October, up 73% from last October. Remember that October 2006 was the final month before the Wii and PlayStation 3 launched in North America, so the pre-launch lull could explain such a significant yearly increase. It should be interesting to see how next month's data stacks up against the launch-filled period that was one year ago.
