August 2019 Game sales in the United States come to a new low, never seen in 21 years

The NPD group released its report on sales of the US video game industry for August 2019. It presents an overview of US corporate health through consoles, games, and accessories.

Total spend on video game software in August 2019 dropped 22% to $ 257 million from August 2018, making it the worst software performance in August since August 1998 ( $ 234 million). However, dollar sales of video games in the United States rose 1% to $ 3.1 billion, up 1% from last year, thanks to Nintendo Switch.

Madden NFL 20 was the bestseller of August 2019, occupying the No. 1 lead position for a second consecutive month. In total, Madden NFL 20 is the third best-selling game from 2019 to date, just behind Kingdom Hearts III and Mortal Kombat 11.

Note also for August 2019 that Minecraft was the second best-selling seller in August 2019, which represents the highest level ever achieved by the game in the sales charts of the NPD in the United States.

One of the new releases of August 2019, Age of Wonders: Planetfall, debuted at 15th place. Its first month sales were higher than any other title in the franchise history. Another noteworthy feature of the report is that five of the top ten best-selling games in August 2019 were Nintendo Switch exclusives.

You can see the complete picture of the top 20 sellers below.

In terms of hardware, total console expenses dropped 22% from August 2018 to $ 167 million. Since the beginning of the year, spending has decreased by 21% to $ 1.6 billion. The Nintendo Switch console was the best-selling console of the month of August 2019 and the best-selling system in 2019. Sales of PS4 and Xbox One consoles declined in August 2019 and for the entire year up to In 2019, the switch being the only home console system to record improved sales.

All of this makes sense as the Switch is relatively new compared to the PS4 and Xbox One, which are celebrating their sixth anniversary, with the next generation systems planned for Holiday 2020.

In August 2019, total spending on video games in the United States – games, consoles and accessories – reached $ 666 million, down 18% from August 2018. On a cumulative basis, all segments combined is down 6% to $ 7 billion.