Analyst Notes provided by Mat Piscatella of The NPD Group and Dennis Yeh of Sensor Tower.
U.S. consumer spending on video game content, hardware and accessories totaled $4.3 billion, down 5% from a year earlier. Spending on video game hardware remained flat, while spending on content (-5%) and accessories (-14%) declined.
Declines in mobile content, physical console content and spending on game controllers drove the January revenue shortfall. Spending on video game content fell 5% in January from a year earlier, to $3.8 billion. Growth in spending on non-mobile subscriptions and console add-on digital content could not offset declines in other areas.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was once again the best-selling game of the month, and it’s the fourth consecutive time the title has topped the market for premium software dollar sales. Four new games ranked among the top 20 best-selling games in January, led by Dead Space, which ranked 2nd. Other newcomers include Fire Emblem Engage (5th), Forspoken (7th), and One Piece Odyssey (9th).
The Last of Us: Part I jumped from 36th place in the rankings in December to 11th place in January, thanks in part to the debut of The Last of Us series on HBO.
Another title that took a big step up in the rankings is Monster Hunter: Rise, released for PlayStation and Xbox platforms in January 2023. These new releases helped lift Monster Hunter: Rise from 68th place in the rankings. December to 13th place in January.
In the mobile sector, Sensor Tower reported that the top 10 games by US consumer spending were: Candy Crush Saga, Roblox, Royal Match, Coin Master, Township, Evony, Homescapes, Pokémon Go, Jackpot Party and Bingo Blitz. . Gardenscapes, a puzzle game, surged in January, jumping from 22nd to 11th place in the mobile game rankings after increasing in-app spending by 21% over the previous year.
Spending on video game hardware was flat from a year ago at $393 million. Growth in hardware spending for PlayStation 5 and Switch was offset by declines on other platforms. The PlayStation 5 was the top-selling platform in January 2023 by both unit sales and dollar sales, while the Switch ranked 2nd on both metrics.
Spending on accessories fell 14% in January from a year earlier, to $165 million. Lower spending on game controllers is driving most of this decline. The PS5 DualSense Midnight Black wireless controller was January’s top-selling accessory in dollar terms.
