Data presented during this year's GDC has revealed interesting trends into gamer habits over the last year, with digital on the rise.
As the industry shifts towards less packaged and more downloadable products, figures compiled by the NPD, iResearch and Digi-Capital have highlighted a rise of 33% in sales of digital releases and download content in the USA plus the "big" European three - UK, France and Germany.
In the US alone, with contributed $5.9 billion in download sales last year, the figure makes up 40% of all sales. It's a leap from 28% back in 2010.
More interestingly, in 2012 new retail games was less than half the $14.8 billion spent on video games, making a decline in over 22% from 2011, with used games dropping 17.1%. The remaining figures are split between used titles, digital releases, subscriptions, DLC, mobile and rentals.
To put that in some perspective, for 2012 in the US alone:
- New retail/packaged games - $7.1 billion
- Used games - $1.59 billion
- Digital games/DLC - $2.22 billion
- Mobile gaming - $2.11 billion
- Subscriptions - $1.05 billion
- Social gaming - $544 million
- Rentals - $198 million
The spend for digital releases on mobiles was also compared, showing that in the US around 27% of users paid for mobile games, whilst a larger chunk of 40% paid in Europe.
Digi-Capital predicts that games developed in Asia, like mobile, MMO and social, could dominate the markets globally, with more acquisitions from Western publishers into the ever-popular world of online and MMO gaming.
Nintendo eShop releases also seem to be on the rise after the Japanese gaming giant included Wii U and 3DS titles as full digital downloads on the eShop. In Japan Animal Crossing: New Leaf continues to sell exceptionally well, with a quarter of sales coming from downloads at launch.
Whether people prefer traditional retail over digital, the download sphere is growing and absorbing the market at a rapid rate.
Have you leapt onboard the digital train completely or are you hopping off at retail stops for certain releases?