The NPD Group, which tracks physical game and hardware sales at retail, has released its report for the month of November.
Unsurprisingly, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was the top-selling game in the United States for November, with first month sales of the game up “about 7 percent” over Black Ops. The second biggest selling game of the month was The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, which is now only 500,000 units away from the lifetime sales of Oblivion.
Here’s the software top ten list:
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (360, PS3, Wii, PC)**
- Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (360, PS3, PC)**
- Battlefield 3 (360, PS3, PC)**
- Assassin’s Creed: Revelations (360, PS3, PC)
- Just Dance 3 (Wii, 360)
- Madden NFL 12 (360, PS3, Wii, PSP, PS2)**
- Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception (PS3)**
- Saints Row: The Third (360, PS3, PC)**
- The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Wii) **
- Batman: Arkham City (360, PS3, PC)**
**(includes CE, GOTY editions, bundles, etc. but not those bundled with hardware)
Game Informer was apparently also told Uncharted 3 sold 700,000 units, coming in at number 7. Batman: Arkham City, which was tenth, sold more than 625,000 units.
The Xbox 360 was the best-selling console for the the fourth month in a row, totaling 1.7 million units. It had its best sales week ever during the week of Thanksgiving and Black Friday, managing to sell over one million units in that short period.
NPD analyst Anita Frazier said:
The gap between 360 sales and sales of the next best selling platform was the largest we’ve seen since December 2008 when the Nintendo DS was the top selling system.
Nintendo sold over 860,000 Wiis, 795,000 3DS’ and 350,000 DS’. Despite its age, and the announcement of the Wii U, the Wii had its biggest ever Black Friday.
Sony, on the other hand, didn’t share any figures in its NPD statement (NeoGAF math estimates 900k), but SCEA’s senior director of corporate communications, Patrick Seybold, said:
PlayStation 3 is off to a phenomenal start to the holiday season, recording the best ever Black Friday sales period in the console’s five-year history. According to the November NPD report the PS3 saw a 70% increase in hardware and a 30% increase in software year-over-year.
Consumer demand has been very strong for our holiday bundles and for recent first and third party blockbuster titles such as Uncharted 3, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. We’re excited that millions of people are joining the PlayStation community and realizing its incredible entertainment value across games, movies, TV, music, and more.
This November was the best November on record for sales of new physical content, helped greatly by Modern Warfare 3. Overall, US game sales – which includes software, hardware, and accessories – was up 0.4% to $3 billion over last November’s $2.99 billion. Hardware was down 9% (due to price cuts), from $1.08 billion to $982.4 million. Software rose 15%, from $1.4 billion to $1.67 billion.
