London 2012 - The Official Video Game of the Olympic Games News for Xbox 360

UK games retail at an all-time low

NewsPublish Date 03/08/2012 - 12:09pm GMT+1

Game sales the lowest since records began.

The UK games retail market made £8.4 million from sales last week, the lowest on record.

MCV reports the statistics, as listed by the UKIE/GfK Chart Track. The typical slow summer is highlighted by the lack of new titles.

A total of 394,688 games were sold last week, with SEGA's official game of the London 2012 Olympics topping the charts.

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Highest Rated Comment

extrasafeivy

I have my own Independent Video Game Shop and I just posted my best ever week in 3 years.

Posted 16:49 on 04 August 2012

User Comments

CheekyLee @ extrasafeivy

So glad to hear that! Any ideas as to why? Insight like yours would be incredibly interesting to hear.

Posted 14:10 on 05 August 2012

extrasafeivy

I have my own Independent Video Game Shop and I just posted my best ever week in 3 years.

Posted 16:49 on 04 August 2012

Black Ops 2, Gears of War: Judgment, Medal of Honor, FIFA, PES, Assassin's Creed 3, Halo 4 and a myriad of other titles out around the same time.

I don't see how publishers can complain about the summer slump when when they all wait for that same holiday window. If a title like CoD came out in the summer, I'm pretty sure these reports would say something different.

Posted 15:16 on 04 August 2012

munkee

It's because my GAME store was closed and my career in video game retail came to an abrupt end. I was drawing in pretty big crowds in that place. This is merely the knock-on effect..

Posted 22:34 on 03 August 2012

Clockpunk

I can't tell for sure, but do these records cover preowned titles as well?

Otherwise, as has been pointed out, with no big hitting 'must have' title out recently, why would anyone have cause to suspect strong sales to come from out of nowhere?

Posted 19:01 on 03 August 2012

rbevanx@ MrGloomy

Yeah I agree to an extent.

A great example was Deus Ex: HR last year which came out before the other major games and gained from it in my view.
But I think the people behind the scenes believe that summer blockbuster films, Euro's, Olympics and weather are too many factors for this year, just a thought anyway.

Posted 17:21 on 03 August 2012

TOMBOY25

my bro went to our local gamstation for gears of war 3 £24.99 pre owned he came home went online bought it for £9.99 prices in store are crazy

Posted 14:49 on 03 August 2012

MrGloomy

I think it doesn't help when publishers moan about the state of games sales during the summer period, then they don't release titles until afterwards, even though there are many titles that are in fact ready for release during that period. Publishers are so intent on releasing key titles during the Winter/November period that it's not only affecting they're own game sales, but bringing the games market down as a whole. Unless the major publishers take more risks during the summer drought, how are they ever going to improve overall sales on their yearly targets. Risky, but it could be worth it.

Posted 12:32 on 03 August 2012

MJTH

Summer games drought, steam/ PSN /Eshop/ XLBA sales, nearing the end of a console generation, Wii U coming out so people want to save up for it, saving for october/ november games season.

These are the many reason why the industry is stagnant at the moment it should start picking up after gamescom hopefully.

Posted 12:25 on 03 August 2012