Video Games retail / e-tail sales in U.S. June 2013

These sales figures represent new physical retail sales of hardware, software and accessories, which account for roughly 50 percent of the total consumer spend on games. When taking into account our preliminary estimate for other physical format sales in June such as used and rentals at $118 million, and our estimate for digital format sales including full game and add-on content downloads including micro-transactions, subscriptions, mobile apps and the consumer spend on social network games at $544 million, the total consumer spend in June is $1.2 billion.

• NPDs final assessment of the consumer spend in these areas outside of new physical retail sales will be reported in August in its Q2 2013 Games Market Dynamics: U.S. report.

NPD Group's U.S. Games Industry Sales (New Physical Sales Channel*) - June 2013

5-week month; Reporting Period 6/2/13 through 7/6/13

Hardware

Nintendo's 3DS maintained the top spot for overall hardware sales across all platforms for the second consecutive month. The Xbox 360 was the highest selling console, continuing its streak for the thirtieth month in a row.

June 2012 was the first month of retail sales for Ouya (not counting direct sales through ouya.tv) and were relatively light for a new console. This may be due to the lack of a major marquee title driving consumers to seek out the console, low awareness due to Ouya being a new brand, or low inventory volume due to manufacturing constraints.

Software

To quote Nintendo during E3, 'software sells hardware', which is evident in this month's 3DS results. Strong double-digit increases in the 3DS hardware sales were coupled with triple-digit digit increases in software for June sales. 3DS software sales momentum is building due to a steady flow of content over the past few months, leading to positive year-to-date sales results.

The Last of Us was the top selling game at retail in the month of June. To put this in context, it had the second highest first-month sales of a PS3 first-party game, after God of War 3 in March 2010. The Last of Us was also the third highest game to launch during the month of June since NPD began tracking sales in 1995.

Animal Crossing: New Leaf also sold well in the context of first-party games for the 3DS, having the third highest first-month sales next to two launches from holiday 2011: Mario Kart 7, and Super Mario 3D Land.

Minecraft's successful foray into physical retail shows that digital products can reach a new market when launching a physical disc. While many have downloaded the game, these sales indicate that there are plenty of consumers willing to buy a physical disc who are either not connected to the internet, don't have a credit card to purchase digital games online, or simply prefer the physical disk over digital copies.

This is the first time since this console generation began that the top 3 games that sold through retail were first-party platform exclusives - each from a different first party; in this case, The Last of Us, Animal Crossing: New Leaf, and Minecraft.

Four of the top 10 games were launched in June. Collectively, new launches in June generated over 90 percent more unit sales than games launched last June.

Accessories

While increased point and subscription card sales offset accessory declines, the overall category declined this June due to a drop in the top 3 accessory types: Gamepads, Headsets/Headphones, and 'All Other' Accessories.