Research shows $14.80 billion spent on video game content in the U.S. for 2012

According to the 2012 Games Market Dynamics: U.S.* report from global information company, The NPD Group, in addition to the $7.09 billion spent in the U.S. by consumers on new physical video and PC game software during 2012, the total consumer spend on other physical forms of content (used and rental) reached $1.79 billion, and content in digital format (full game and add-on content downloads, subscriptions, mobile games and social network games) generated $5.92 billion.

"When including all other forms of content spending outside of new physical games, the 2012 U.S. games market was more than twice as large as the total spending on new physical games alone," said Liam Callahan, industry analyst, The NPD Group. "There were divergent trends when looking at content spending in 2012 as a whole, with a decrease of 21 percent in spending on physical content while digital content spending grew 16 percent; both formats combined for a total decline of 9 percent for the year."

Methodology

The estimates are published in NPD's report, Games Market Dynamics: U.S. (formerly known as the Games Industry: Total Consumer Spend) -released by The NPD Group in February 2013 - and are derived leveraging NPD's portfolio of physical POS tracking (Retail Tracking Service) and consumer research including the Games Acquisition Monitor, Video Game and PC Game Subscriptions Report and Consumer Tracking Service. It also incorporates consumer spend estimation provided by NPD retail and publisher partners, and calibration with third-party sources.