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NPD Releases May Videogame Sales Data for the USA Market

By Jacob Mazel 13th Jun 2008
Nintendo, Microsoft, Sony, 5,264 views

Wii and DS lead hardware sales again this month as Xbox360 and PS3 fail to make an impression

NPD Releases May Data for the Four Weeks Ending May 31, 2008

Jacob Mazel

6.12.2008

NPD Data for May 2008

As expected, Wii was the top selling console for the month, selling 675,089 units according to a press release Nintendo issued based on the latest NPD US figures. The platform behind was the DS, which sold 452,608 units. PS3 followed, with sales of just over 208,000 units. Xbox 360 and PSP sold between 180,000 and 190,000 units though the former was ahead by about 4,000. PS2 sold 132,000 units according to IGN and a Sony press release.

Top software for the month in the USA, according to NPD included Pokemon Dungeon 2 as individual skus, Wii Fit, Grand Theft Auto IV on PS3 and Xbox 360, Wii Play, Super Smash Brothers Brawl for Wii, Mario Kart Wii, Iron Man for PS2, and Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock for Wii. Vgchartz data showed nearly the exact same top ten for the four week period, as can be seen below.

Xbox 360 and Wii are both within 50,000 units of 10.2 million through May 31, 2008 according to NPD, though Wii did not quite pass Xbox 360 in the month. PS3 stands at over 4.4 million now by NPD figures for the USA.

For information on how Vgchartz data compares to NPD data for the month see below.

NPD Data and VGC Expectations for NPD

Last Saturday, Vgchartz posted its expectations for NPD sales . The NPD data released data covers the USA, while Vgchartz data covers the Americas. However, since Michael Pachter previews NPD data and not VGC data we provided him with scaled down VGC data as an estimate for what NPD would report for USA sales. In the VGC preview, it was stated that Americas sales were expected to be along these lines:

Rank	Game	Platform	Publisher	Americas Sales
1	Grand Theft Auto IV	Xbox 360	Take Two	1,311,938
2	Mario Kart Wii	Wii	Nintendo	991,181
3	Wii Fit	Wii	Nintendo	869,665
4	Grand Theft Auto IV	PS3	Take Two	617,873
5	Wii Play	Wii	Nintendo	381,885
6	Super Smash Brothers Brawl	Wii	Nintendo	276,394
7	Pokemon Mysterious Dungeon 2	DS	Nintendo	269,929
8	Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare	Xbox 360	Activision	171,821
9	Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock	Wii	Activision	143,062
10	Rockband	Xbox 360	EA	136,169

Americas	Sales
Platform	10-May	17-May	24-May	31-May	Total	Weekly Avg.
Wii	130,059	104,559	324,028	158,384	717,030	179,258
PS3	56,580	50,968	46,636	43,581	197,765	49,441
Xbox 360	49,771	47,773	55,508	60,272	213,324	53,331
PSP	51,590	51,020	51,997	60,046	214,653	53,663
DS	132,300	119,992	121,612	130,636	504,540	126,135
PS2	32,506	29,329	27,255	28,570	117,660	29,415

When scaling down the Americas data for Pachter’s preview, VGC arrived at the following figures. Gamasutra and others show that Pachter used the scaled down Americas values from VGC for estimating the USA market per NPD, so NPD USA data, VGC Americas data, and VGC estimates for the USA are included below.

Platform	VGC Americas	VGC USA Est	NPD USA
Wii	717,030	645,327	675,100
PS3	197,765	177,989	208,700
Xbox 360	213,324	191,992	186,600
PSP	214,653	193,188	182,300
DS	504,540	454,086	452,600
PS2	117,660	105,894	132,000

Software data provided for Pachter’s preview was also scaled down as a preview for NPD USA data.

Rk.	Game	Platform	NPD US	VGC US	VGC Americas
1	Grand Theft Auto IV	Xbox 360	871,300	1,180,744	1,311,938
2	Mario Kart Wii	Wii	787,400	892,063	991,181
3	Wii Fit	Wii	687,700	782,699	869,665
4	Grand Theft Auto IV	PS3	442,900	556,086	617,873
5	Wii Play	WIi	294,600	343,697	381,885
6	Super Smash Brothers Brawl	Wii	171,100	248,755	276,394
7	Iron Man	PS2	130,600	53,739	59,710
8	Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock	Wii	116,800	128,756	143,062
9	Pokemon Mystery Dungeon 2: EOD*	DS	109,000	242,936	269,929
10	Pokemon Mystery Dungeon 2: EOT*	DS	102,000	242,936	269,929

	*VGC combined skus, NPD didn't