Mass Effect 3 can't offset 25% sales decline in US during March - NPD

NPD has revealed its March US retail sales data, and as several analysts predicted, despite BioWare's Mass Effect 3 topping the charts, overall it's not pretty. Total game industry sales dropped 25 percent to $1.1 billion, as total software across consoles, portable and PC fell 26 percent to $585.1 million, while hardware sales plunged 35 percent to $323.5 million.

[Dante112]

So all of the hardware dropped for consoles as well as for it's software. Interesting...

[SuperLupe]

Time for a new generation of consoles.

[kreate]

or time to tap a different region of market cuz the US market is getting saturated.

[donniebaseball]

The retail picture for the industry is going to continue to be ugly. Digital is becoming more and more important and NPD doesn't offer any monthly digital data.

EDIT: On a side note, as a baseball nut and a HUGE fan of MLB The Show, very happy to see it doing well on the charts.

[MaideninBlack]

582k copies of Raccoon City sold. Looks like Slant Six gets the last laugh.

[Dante112]

Lol, that's what I thought. I ended up buying it too *ducks flying chairs and tables*

Edit: @ donniebaseball

Are you the same guy who posts on the gametrailers forums?

[Dlacy13g]

bring on the new hardware...

[Tai_Kaliso]

There wasn't any games worth getting aside from Mass Effect 3. I mean there are some niche titles, but when a bad game like Raccoon City is getting crazy sales like it is, you know gamers are starving for new games.

I don't know why publishers all release their games so late in the year, I wish they would spread them out a bit more like last year. I mean didn't we have a lot more as far as quality games around this time last year? L.A. Noire, Portal 2, Crysis 2 and Homefront I believe all released early in the year.

[BitbyDeath]

Starhawk is about to release very soon.

[kevnb]

not to mention mass effect 3 was bundled with connect for the same usual price of kinect at many retailers.