U.S Consumers Are Not Cutting Back On Buying Video Games

Despite the economic recession, the retail sales of U.S. video games in November are showing a 10 percent increase from a year ago. The Overall sales of U.S. video games this year through November had increased by 22 percent from the sales of 2007.

The report released by market researcher NPD Group showing that U.S. consumers are not cutting back on buying video games. The increasing sales of video games also contribute to the 5 percent increase sales of gaming hardware to $494.7 million.

The report also shows that Nintendo Wii is leading the way in the battle of game console by selling 803,000 units in October. Microsoft Xbox 360 only manage to take the second spot by selling over 370,000 units in October with their price cut sales. In third, Sony Playstation 3 seen an increase of 18.2 percent over the previous month with 190,000 units of their PS3 Console sold.

According to Anita Frazier (NPD Group Analyst), the sales of video games remain strong despite the slowing economy mainly contribute by the variation of wide content on newer generation game consoles such as Nintendo’s Wii, Microsoft’s XBOX 360 and Sony’s Playstation 3.

U.S. consumers still consider video games are the cheapest form of entertainment because the hours of gaming entertainment value a video game can provide. Matt Helgeson (Senior Editor, Game Informer magazine) also agrees that some video games can take up to three months of playing time to complete and they “provide the ultimate escapism” during these recession times. Video games are not only for kids anymore, they had cut across ages, gender, races, social groups, etc. It is not about “Do you play video games?” anymore, It is “What games are you playing?” now.