U.S. retail sales of video game hardware, software and accessories took a 20 percent nosedive in July to $707.7 million, hurt by a combination of less demand for video game consoles and no major game title released during the month, according to market research firm NPD Group.
Is anyone actually surprised? Consumer confidence is in the toilet. People can’t find jobs, people who have jobs are terrified they’ll lose them, the dollar is taking a beating, and Congress and the President are faring incredibly poorly in polls. No one has an incentive to spend money, especially on discretionary items like games.
Then again there’s the old saw that says the entertainment industry does well during economic hard times. These results could be from people shifting from dedicated video game hardware to iOS devices.
Actually video games (and entertainment in general) tend to weather poor economic conditions better than most. (Check out the numbers from 2008 when things were really in the toilet) People still need to relax and it’s much easier to justify a $50 game that you can play for days/weeks on end (esp Multi-player) than spending the same or more on dinner & a movie.
The App Store keeps selling, my apps keep selling.
Perhaps there’s not much money left after people get their Apple on.
The XBox 360 will be entering its 7th year of existence and the Wii and Playstation3 their 6th years of existence. It is hard to hold people’s interest that long and I would bet anyone here money, sales will go up as they always do around the holidays…
@facebook-1379504631:disqus Because Apps at $1.00 are such a drag on the economy? Have you bought any desktop/PS3/Xbox games lately? You appear to be living in the 1990’s when Apple earned ye olde reputation as expensive. This is not the world, nor century, we live in now. Reuters: “Apple’s relatively small retail presence in Europe — with 52 stores compared with 238 in the United States — offers a chance to the likes of Samsung, Acer and Research in Motion, Forrester said.But their prices cannot yet compete with Apple, which has far larger scale in the tablet market and an efficient supply chain.”This Is the New AppleDigiTimes : “The sub-US$999 target price could be sustained if Intel is willing to lower its CPU prices and hand out a subsidy of US$100 per unit for marketing efforts, the sources argued.” Matching the MacBook Air’s $999 Price