Games Sales Power On Through May 2021 According to NPD
Video game sales increased again in the United States. The industry saw a year-over-year increase in sales when comparing to last May, according to industry tracking company The NPD Group. This is largely because of the sales power of Resident Evil: Village as well as the demand for new-generation hardware and software.
NPD analyst Mat Piscatella confirmed that “May 2021 consumer spending across video game hardware, content and accessories increased 3% when compared to a year ago, reaching $4.5 billion,”
| May 2021 Dollar Sales, Millions | May 2020 | May 2021 | Change | |
| Total Video Game Sales | $4,343 | $4,452 | 3% | |
| Video Game Content (Physical & Digital Full Game, DLC/MTX and Subscription consumer spending across Console, Cloud, Mobile*, Portable, PC and VR) platforms) | $3,955 | $4,066 | 3% | |
| Video Game Hardware | $233 | $244 | 5% | |
| Video Game Accessories | $154 | $142 | -8% | |
| * Mobile spending provided by Sensor Tower |
In April, the industry was able to produce similar results to its previous work despite many orders for computers and video games being reduced during the first few months of pandemic-related stay-at-home orders in the U.S. Even in the midst of concerns about long-term effects of an influx of video game customers, they haven’t lost interest in watching movies and TV or gaming.
What this shows is that that the games industry has shown considerable increase in sales in 2021 compared to 2020.
Piscatella commented “Year-to-date consumer spending totaled $24 billion, a 17% increase compared to the same period in 2020,”
The best-selling games in the U.S. in May
NPD, being an organization of retailers, tracks all digital sales. However, there are many corporations who refuse to participate at all. Nintendo is an unemployed company in the figures because it does not share its sales, and Activision does not provide its Battle. net sales.
However from the figure we have Nintendo did see long-term sales growth for its games. Nintendo has seven games in the top 20 chart, they nclude 2017 releases such as Mario Kart 8 and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.
Another company that showed strong figures in may was Sony. This was maily thanks to its back catalogue with four games the Top 20. That includes MLB: The Show 21, Returnal , Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales, and even Days Gone re-entered the chart at No. 20.
Days Very Much Not Gone
Days Gone was a surprise re-entry. In April it was way outside The Chart however the it was given a significant boost by Steam.
“Days Gone was the 20th best-selling game of May 2021, after placing 247th on the April chart, Days Gone was released to the PC platform via Steam on May 17, 2021” Piscatella said.
Current Top 10 best-selling games for 2021
| Rank | Last Month Rank | Year-to-Date Ending May 2021 Top 10 Games (Physical and Full Game Digital from the Nintendo eShop, PlayStation, STEAM and Xbox platforms for publishers in the Digital Leader Panel) ranked on dollar sales | Publisher |
| 1 | 1 | Call of Duty: Black Ops: Cold War | Activision Blizzard (Corp) |
| 2 | NEW | Resident Evil: Village | Capcom USA |
| 3 | 3 | MLB: The Show 21^ | Sony (Corp) |
| 4 | 2 | Super Mario 3D World* | Nintendo |
| 5 | 4 | Monster Hunter: Rise | Capcom USA |
| 6 | 5 | Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales | Sony (Corp) |
| 7 | 6 | Outriders | Square Enix Inc (Corp) |
| 8 | 8 | Mario Kart 8* | Nintendo |
| 9 | 7 | Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla | Ubisoft |
| 10 | 9 | Minecraft | Multiple Video Game Manufacturers |
| * Digital sales not included | |||
| ^ Xbox Digital sales not included |
James is a journalism graduate with a passion for technology particularly in the gaming field.
