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[reksveks]

Sales of physical video games during the Black Friday week were down 15% compared to the same period the year before, GfK data reveals.

Software sales over Black Friday have been on the wane in recent years. Last year, Black Friday sales were down 10% over the year before.

Please note that this data does not include the digital sales that happened over Black Friday week. It also doesn't include console sales data. Both digital and hardware sales figures will be made available later.

The best-selling boxed game of the week was FIFA 23, with sales up 95%. The EA game was reduced and also included in hardware bundles. It will also have benefitted from the World Cup, which kicked off last week. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is back up to No.2 after sales rose 9%, despite the game not receiving a significant discount.

Last week's big new releases, Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, fell down the charts this week. Violet is down to No.3, while Scarlet is down to No.6. Both games dropped 64% in sales week-on-week, which is a reasonable number for a Pokémon game. Last year's Pokémon titles dropped around 58% in their second week (and from a smaller base), while Pokémon Legends: Arceus, released in January this year, fell 72%. If fan disappointment over the game's technical performance is hurting sales, we're yet to see it in the figures.

Mario Kart 8: Deluxe jumps to No.5 after a 226% increase in sales. Nintendo's hugely popular racing game was last Black Friday's No.1 seller due to the launch of a Switch bundle. Once again, the game raced up the charts due to a similar Black Friday offer.

Another game that benefitted from Black Friday was Sonic Frontiers. The title only came out three weeks ago, but was reduced in price to just over £30 during Black Friday. As a result, the Sega platform game rose 203% in sales and is up to No.7.

Retail copies of Switch games performed very well over Black Friday. Nintendo Switch Sports (No.8) enjoyed a sales rise of 138%, Animal Crossing: New Horizons (No.10) is up 85% and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (No.11) jumped 426% -- the latter was part of a hardware bundle from Amazon.

LEGO games also performed well. LEGO Harry Potter Collection is at No.12 with sales up 174% (the game was reduced to around £15), while LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga was just behind it at No.13 due to a £20 offer.

One of the biggest deals over Black Friday was for the Xbox Series S console, which was reduced by £60. However, as the console is digital-only, its popularity would have had no impact on these physical retail charts.

There are some new games in the Top 40. Just Dance 2023 Edition is at No.9 and launch sales are 173% bigger than what Just Dance 2022 managed. 83% of the Ubisoft game's sales were on Nintendo Switch, and it was included in some Switch bundles during the week.

Meanwhile, Evil West from Focus Home Interactive makes No.21.

Here is the GfK UK Boxed Top Ten for the week ending November 26:
Title
FIFA 23
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Pokémon Scarlet
Mario Kart 8: Deluxe
God of War Ragnarok
Pokémon Scarlet
Sonic Frontiers
NIntendo Switch Sports
Just Dance 2023
Animal Crossing: New Horizons

There's a typo in the charts

Source: https://www.gamesindustry.biz/black-friday-video-game-sales-down-15-uk-boxed-charts

 

[Lucifers Beard]

I don’t really remember seeing many good deals at all. There’s also a recession in the UK which has likely contributed to less games being bought. People barely have money for food and heating, let alone these luxury items.

 

[Gaiff]

Microsoft and Sony when they see Nintendo sell games with $25 budgets at full price for years and still topping charts:

 

[Fake]

Terrible deals here. Nothing new.

 

[yazenov]

Still pending hardware and digital data.

 

[diffusionx]

The economy is falling apart, inflation is rampant, people are spending way more of their money on essentials like food and energy, yes of course discretionary spending on stuff like vidya is going to slow down.

 

[elladarapanta]

physical videogames. I do not think it's important metrics since digital games sell more and more.

 

[ADiTAR]

There are great deals on digital games tbh, I can see people moving to buy those. Indie games especially see a very healthy market on deals.

 

[Fake]

physical videogames. I do not think it's important metrics since digital games sell more and more.

Nintendo Switch say hello.

 

[TGO]

I saw TLOUPT1 for under £40 I'm surprised it didn't make the list.
There was some good sales better then what's on the PSstore.
Maybe people are just not caring and paying the extra

 

[cinnamonandgravy]

at least in the US, there's thanksgiving day sales, pre-black friday sales, black friday, cyber monday, oops-you-missed-it post-cyber monday sales... just wtf.
plus the deals are crap.

it's all just noise now.

 

[elladarapanta]

Nintendo Switch say hello.

again, my statement speaks for itself, digital games have a higher and higher percentage of market cap as time goes by.

 

[Fake]

again, my statement speaks for itself

Can't argue with that logic.

 

[Ghost of Caelid]

Aren't boxed sales declining in general so it can just be part of the total decline? The best game deals are all on the store.

 

[elladarapanta]

Aren't boxed sales declining in general so it can just be part of the total decline? The best game deals are all on the store.

Well, no, if you read the thread you will figure out that despite the fact that boxed/digital sales ratio gets smaller day by day, at the same time boxed sales decrease and increase and decrease and increase because... Nintendo Switch.
If you understand it, explain it to me as well.

 

[MrA]

again, my statement speaks for itself, digital games have a higher and higher percentage of market cap as time goes by.

Physical still makes up more than half of new release sales and account for like an quarter of a billion games a year,
People that aren't nearly smart as they think they are see 80% digital derp derp derp must be 80% of the latest releases were sold digitally and 20% physically
So if game x sold 20k physical it sold 80k digital, and you'd be wrong
The 80% us all software, Taco jumps, burger rollers and the entire 5000 game back catalog and yes the latest
releases
So a game that flopped physically likely flopped digitally as the new at launch share is usually 50 50, moving in favor of physical for a while especially during holiday sales the back digitally after new copies dry up
So if physical is down, that means new releases are down and indicates digital will be down