Yes, it’s football season again in America which means autumn is on the way. And a new Madden NFL game is atop the charts.
The world is returning to its natural order.
Jokes aside, I first want to say I hope everyone is well in this challenging portion of the pandemic. Which is still going on, despite what some might have you believe. I wish you and your families all the best during this still difficult time. Hang in there.
Hopefully for a quick distraction, industry tracking firm NPD Group reported its monthly U.S. games spending report for August 2021. It’s a huge one. As in almost $4.4 billion in spending, which marks an August record for overall sales across the industry’s history.
Within the Video Game Content category, which saw monthly sales growth of 5%, the aforementioned Madden NFL 2022 led the total software chart. This is a feat the Electronic Arts-published franchise has accomplished now for a staggering 22 straight years during its launch month! The last time a Madden NFL title wasn’t the best-seller in its first month was August 1999 when wrestling game WWF Attitude outpaced the start of Madden NFL 2000. Granted, this was a time when the latter of which had a limited amount of days during that measured period.
Mobile continues its climb notably as more people open up their commutes and traveling, accounting for over $2 billion or roughly 45% of the domestic spending total. Led by Candy Crush Saga, Garena Free Fire and Roblox among others, this segment is a driving force behind the record August performance.
Swapping to the console side, Nintendo Switch, Sony’s PlayStation 5 and even Xbox Series X|S continue solid trends leading Video Game Hardware category spending to a 45% increase and an August dollar total that hadn’t been reached since 2008. Nintendo Switch was the best-selling in August by unit sales, thus retaining its spot as the top-seller for 2021 so far. This unit sales lead is the 33rd consecutive month for the hybrid console, which I expect to continue thru next month and beyond with the launch of its new OLED model.
PlayStation 5’s first year momentum marches on despite widespread supply shortages. It was August’s highest-selling platform by dollar sales, a metric by which it also leads for the year to date.
The literally massive PlayStation 5 has been on sale for 10 months now. During that time, it’s the fastest-selling PlayStation brand platform in tracked history. As I noted last month in July, NPD Group reported it was the fastest-selling hardware ever thru nine months at the time. Now that its comparison has reached the Nintendo Switch’s holiday season, the PlayStation 5 no longer holds the top spot. Still an impressive run given constraints on the inventory side. It could even return to being the quickest seller, depending where production goes.
Now that I’ve hit the highlights, it’s time to move into the full August figures.
United States Games Industry Sales (August 1st, 2021 – August 28th, 2021):
As detailed in the above gallery, overall consumer spending rose 7% to $4.37 billion during August 2021. Spurred mainly by Madden, mobile, subscriptions plus both older and newer hardware growth despite semi-conductor concerns, this is an August month record across NPD Group’s tracking history. Full-on proof the games industry keeps on moving as the most popular entertainment vertical.
Expanding to annual figures, total consumer spend on gaming year-to-date hit nearly $38 billion. This is 13% higher than the first eight months of 2020. All of the three major categories saw double-digit growth during this time, showcasing the stickiness of demand, general fan retention and even audience expansion.
Video Game Content i.e. everything from software, mobile and related sales made up the bulk of these monthly totals, reaching $3.88 billion in August. Or around 89% of overall spend. Which is 5% better than the same time last year. Underlying this is the sixth month in a row where mobile alone generated $2 billion, something that only happened three times all of last year.
As NPD Group reports have shown recently, the strength of 2021 to date sales continues with Content alone moving up 11% to $33.33 billion in aggregate during this time-frame.
Digging into individual title performance during August, I mentioned before how Madden NFL 2022 led the chart during its first month on sale and maintained an historic streak going back more than two decades. As a result of.. kicking off this initial performance, the game is immediately the fourth best-selling title of 2021 so far.
Football wasn’t the only big story of the software list. Open world samurai slasher Ghost of Tsushima, which came out on PlayStation 4 back in July 2020, saw a resurgence in August due to the start of its Director’s Cut version including an upgrade path to PlayStation 5 alongside a new expansion. Sony’s PlayStation exclusive was ranked 110th in July. Talk about making moves!
Rounding out the Top 3 was, of course, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War as it entered its latest Season 5 of ongoing content. The military shooter is published by Activision Blizzard, a company that’s still under a lawsuit due to reported workplace toxicity and a culture of abuse towards women and marginalized people. I’m behind the employees fighting back against executives.
Right after this was the 4th best-selling title of the month in turn-based strategy game Humankind. Published by Sega and made by Amplitude Studios, it was the top-selling PC game during August. It’s already 5th on the 2021 to date chart for PC as a platform. An exceptional start, especially for a game without a console release just yet. (I guess it did launch on Google Stadia.. hah.)
Otherwise, the top monthly rankings were about as expected. Business as usual for a couple Nintendo games among the ten best-sellers: the ever-present Mario Kart 8 then The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD moving to 7th from its top spot in July. The publisher has a number more in the Top 20, as always.
Minecraft in there like usual. Assassin’s Creed Valhalla did show a nice move back into the Top 10 from #20 in July, likely due to ongoing support via Ubisoft’s downloadable content. In terms of new releases, No More Heroes 3 from Grasshopper Manufacture started at #42. Tough to contend in August as a Switch exclusive and with only a few days in the tracking period.
Below are the software ranks across all measured platforms for August plus year-to-date.
Top-Selling Games of August 2021, U.S., All Platforms (Physical & Digital Dollar Sales):
- Madden NFL 2022
- Ghost of Tsushima
- Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
- Humankind
- Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales
- Mario Kart 8*
- The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD*
- Minecraft
- Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
- MLB The Show 21^
- Super Smash Bros. Ultimate*
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2019
- Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart
- Animal Crossing: New Horizons*
- Pokémon Sword & Shield*
- Mortal Kombat 11
- Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury*
- The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild*
- Mario: Golf: Super Rush*
- Super Mario Party*
Top-Selling Games, 2021 To Date, U.S., All Platforms (Physical & Digital Dollar Sales):
- Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
- MLB The Show 21^
- Resident Evil: Village
- Madden NFL 22
- Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury*
- Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales
- Mario Kart 8*
- Monster Hunter Rise
- Minecraft
- Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla
Video Game Hardware remained the biggest monthly grower shared by NPD Group, jumping 45% to $329 million in total spend last month. This is the single best August result for the category since $395 million back in August 2008.
“Were enough units available to actually satiate consumer demand this year, I have little doubt this record would have been absolutely smashed,” said NPD Group’s Mat Piscatella after sharing the report.
And I concur. We’ll never know the ceiling for hardware sales during these recent months with a dire chip situation for everything from automobiles to consumer tech to appliances and beyond. The unfortunate part is how this is expected to continue in the near-term, so this category’s true potential during this latest generation of platforms won’t be revealed until years to come.
Within these constraints, I mentioned before how Nintendo Switch retained the top spot in August and 2021 by unit sales thus increasing its incredible streak of monthly wins. Since November 2018! This begs the question of how long can it go? Based on a potential pricing move for the base model and demand from enthusiasts for Nintendo Switch OLED, launching worldwide October 8th, my guess is unit sales thru the holiday season will be led by Nintendo’s hybrid console.
Dollar sales leader for both August and year-to-date PlayStation 5 is faring well, even if no longer the fastest-selling platform in history. Both Game Boy Advance and Nintendo Switch are now ahead of PlayStation 5 during each platform’s respective first 10 months on market. Within Sony’s storied gaming history, it’s still top dog. Between that and leading recent months by revenue, partially bolstered by a higher price point than Switch, the PlayStation brand is as ubiquitous as ever.
Similar to recent months, there wasn’t much in the way of details on Microsoft’s Xbox platform sales. NPD Group did reiterate how Microsoft is selling-thru to buyers as many Xbox Series X|S boxes as it can produce in the States. It’s just seemingly not as many as its competitors. I’m curious about these production dynamics, in particular the gap between platform performance. I didn’t see a comparison or any granularity past these general comments.
We’ll have to live for now knowing that all three major manufacturers are performing consistently in the domestic market, just a matter of how well!
Last category on the docket before closing up shop is Video Game Accessories. It’s the only one of the three that didn’t experience growth during August, coming in exactly flat at $164 million in contribution.
This was Microsoft’s category to shine last month. The team’s Xbox Elite Series 2 Wireless Controller achieved best-selling status out of all accessories, implying that even though many people can’t buy consoles, the high-end game pad is attractive. Mainly because of its compatibility with various generations and devices, including Bluetooth capability for use with cloud gaming.
When looking at the year as a whole, the result for Accessories stays much more positive. Its annual figure to date is up 12% compared to last year, reaching nearly $1.59 billion. Sony’s PlayStation 5 DualSense Controller white variant kept its position as the year’s highest-selling accessory. No doubt mapping in parallel to its underlying console trajectory, as folks opt to purchase additional game pads for co-op or multiplayer use.
Another month in the books. While it wasn’t the most eventful, there’s still plenty of news, indicators and trends to follow.
Yet another record for overall spending, this time an August month, and hardware growth leading to the best category result in 13 years. A set of impressive streaks for Nintendo and Electronic Arts, while Sony’s latest platform trajectory remaining the best it’s ever been.
Companies selling out of console stock, trying desperately to make enough to keep up with intense demand. Big movers and shakers on the software side, plus mobile’s steady presence for content spending alongside subscription services increasing in popularity.
Top-end game pads propping up an accessories segment that often moves as hardware does early in a cycle.
September marks the last month of the third quarter already! It’s a busy one, even in a year with noticeably less output at the triple-A level. Perennial seller NBA 2K from Take-Two Interactive has a new annual entry. Nintendo’s silly party game WarioWare: Get It Together is out. Then there’s Deathloop, the unusual Xbox Game Studios title exclusive to PlayStation 5 that I predict will outperform. Life is Strange: True Colors, Lost Judgment, Diablo II: Resurrected and I imagine a surprise or two will be featured in stories upcoming.
Not to mention the biggest topic in hardware next month as Switch’s OLED model hit shelves. How will it fare given the environment, and will PlayStation 5 keep pace? Can Microsoft boost Xbox output to compete in the rankings?
We’ll know more then. Thanks everyone for stopping by this month and hope to see you again soon!
*Digital Sales Not Included, ^Xbox Digital Sales Not Included
Comparisons are year-over-year unless otherwise noted.
Sources: Electronic Arts, Neil Gardose (Photo Credit), The NPD Group, Sensor Tower.
-Dom