U.S. PC Game Sales Up 48% So Far In 2007

According to data from research firm NPD Group, sales of PC games have risen by 48 percent on the previous year, during the first two months of 2007, with sales lead by the success of Blizzard’s World of WarCraft and its expansion The Burning Crusade. Speaking in a feature by The New York Times, NPD’s Anita Frazier indicated that U.S. retails sales of PC games have risen to $203 million, from $136.8 million a year earlier. These figures do not include online sales or online subscriptions to massively multiplayer online (MMO) games such as World of WarCraft. Frazier identified MMOs as the key source of the increase, in particular the January release of The Burning Crusade. During January and February role-playing game sales rose by 43 percent on the PC, largely due to the release of the expansion. “The robust performance we’re seeing in PC game sales can be tied to several key titles across several genres,” said Frazier. “But we’d be remiss not to address the continued success of World of WarCraft.” Overall, PC game sales increased by only 1 percent over the whole of 2006 to $970 million, from a figure of $953 million in 2005. This in turn was a fall of 14 percent from 2004’s total of $1.1 billion in revenues. The feature offers a contrast with console game sales, which reached $4.8 million in 2006 for the U.S., rising to $6.5 million if portable console sales are included.