All not well for video game industry

The video game industry was seen as something that was recession proof back in 2008, Web Pro News says.

Everybody loves video games and people are going to keep buying them. The Wii was still flying off of shelves and people were gobbling up Xbox 360s and PS3s. Things rarely stay good for so long and 2012 has been tough for the gaming industry. It's going to keep getting worse if July NPD numbers are any indication.

The NPD released its usual monthly games industry figures last week and things are not looking good. In the US, consumers spent a collective $1.1 billion on gaming in July. That's down 20% from last year.

Furthermore, the NPD reckons that if these sales trends continue, the industry will only make $14.5 billion in sales this year. The industry as a whole made $17 billion last year.

“While this growth is in stark contrast to the declines in new physical hardware and software sales, the size of digital sales is not quite large enough to offset these declines,” Bloomberg quotes NPD analyst Anita Frazier, as saying.

Microsoft held the console lead for the 19th consecutive month, selling 203 000 Xbox 360 units in July, the company said in a statement.

The Redmond, Washington-based company sold 277 000 units a year ago. The second quarter featured a relatively light slate of new game releases, as publishers withheld popular updates such as shooter-games “Call of Duty” and “Halo” in anticipation of a pickup in demand for holiday gift-giving.