September NPD: Xbox 360 takes the lead, Halo 3 to thank

Though August was an unseasonably successful month for video games, we all saw September coming. Despite being released at the tail end of the month, Microsoft's Halo 3 juggernaut walked right up to the reigning NPD champ and rifle-butted it from behind. The Xbox 360 console jumped up two places with sales of over half a million units, nearly twice as many as in August. Total industry sales for the month: a staggering $1.36 billion thanks in large part to the efforts of Mr. Chief; hardware sales alone rose 188% to $418.6 million.

Microsoft Xbox 360: 527.8K (6.8 million total)
Nintendo Wii: 501K (4.5 million total)
Nintendo DS: 495.8K (13.2 million total)
Sony PlayStation 2: 215K (39.3 million total)
Sony PSP: 284.5K (8.6 million total)
Sony PlayStation 3: 119.4K (1.87 million total)

On the software side, Halo 3 takes a dominant first place lead, single-handedly raising the console software sales for the month 64% to $550.5 million. (Remember $170 million of that was Halo 3's first day of sales; the title sold some 3.3 million units within the NPD's reporting period.)

Xbox 360 remains the most dominant platform in the top 10, selling four titles, including newcomer to the list Skate as well as last month's big 360 performers Madden and BioShock. Metroid Prime 3: Corruption dropped from sixth place to seventh, maintaining its status as the largest Wii release for the month. Sony's platforms didn't fare as well, with no PSP games making the cut, and only one PlayStation 3 game – the well received Heavenly Sword – coming in at 10th place.

Halo 3 (all three SKUs - Xbox 360) – 3.3 million
Wii Play w/ remote (Wii) – 282K
Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (DS) – 224K
Madden NFL 08 (PS2) – 205K
Skate (Xbox 360) – 175K
Madden NFL 08 (Xbox 360) – 173K
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (Wii) – 167K
BioShock (Xbox 360) – 150K
Brain Age 2: More Training in Minutes a Day (DS) – 141K
Heavenly Sword (PS3) – 139K

Reader Comments (170)

I'd trust VGChartz numbers over corporate press releases any day. Their numbers are getting more reliable every month.

VGChartz makes educated guesses for the most part, but once they obtain official Media Create, NPD, etc. data then they update to reflect those. Me? I just like waiting for official numbers because even the best and most logical guesses can turn out to be waaaaaay off.

Yeah I hear you VG chartz is only reliable when its a + for Nintendo and you can access it from work...

Ok noted..

So did you even READ my reply? Here:

http://www.joystiq.com/2007/10/18/september-npd-xbox-360-takes-the-lead-halo-3-to-thank/
http://www.joystiq.com/2007/09/13/august-npd-madden-and-wii-on-top-but-not-together/

August and September NPD numbers, STRAIGHT FROM JOYSTIQ. See if my figures match up.

People don't trust VG Chartz because they take their own data and extrapolate it to the entire market.

However, people do trust NPD because they take their own data and extrapolate it to the entire market.

Does anybody else see a problem here?

VGcharts numbers are up to 10-13-07 so I guess we will have to see if they will match up later on...

The NPD Group is a teeny bit more accurate than how you make them sound.

NPD Group: http://www.npd.com/corpServlet?nextpage=profile_s.html

The NPD Group uses solid sales numbers, a consumer panel of over 3 million people, and over a 100 specialized research reports for specific facets of each industry they track.

VGChartz: http://www.vgchartz.com/methodology.php

VGChartz obtains shipped data from retailers then looks at solid sales figures from the past (gleaned off NPD Group data and the like) and works backward by guessing trends based on historical data.

There is a LOT more analyzing that goes into VGChartz data compared to NPD data. Analyzing is a very small portion of NPD research.

Halo month was the 2nd biggest month yet for the Wii, the biggest since last December, with no new games. I don't get it. October has new games. In October the Wii should go up and the 360 should go down. Halo 3 won't be the #1 game in October, but IF somehow the 360 stays on top and barely beats the Wii one last time, it won't be from Halo 3. It'll be from the magical Orange Box. There's still 3 million nerds out there playing Haloz who don't know about the portals yet.

"The Wii went up against the self-proclaimed 'biggest entertainment launch ever' and we emerged with our best month of the year," Reggie Fils-Aime, president of Nintendo of America, told Reuters.

"They fired their bullet and our gun is loaded and ready to fire throughout the holidays," Fils-Aime said.

I disagree. I think Halo 3 will be the top dog in October. Only this time, the 360 won't be as high up on the chart.

But but but I really really want the O-Box to dethrone Halo 3 for October!

Me too. The Half-Life franchise is a much better sci-fi shooter than the Halo Franchise.

the O-Box isn't going to have the kick to take down Halo. Most people played HL2 two years ago. I think we are seeing more Steam DownLoads for that game.

The Nintendo Holiday list is getting smaller. Galaxy looks great, but is it enough to boost the system? With Brawl pushed till feb 10 and The 360 dumping AAA title after AAA title it's going to be hard to compete.

I played Brawl at E for All yesterday... meh.

It's basically Melee 1.5

Good luck Rubang.

PS - it's not like YOU are boosting these wii game sales.

Hahahahhhaahhaa. Sshshhhh.... Hey I'm buying Guitar Hero 3 in a week!

And if NPD tracked Steam downloads this would be a different story.

seriously its no surprise with the most played series on the xbox and live to have its followers move over to the 360. mostly all i see is people who owned an xbox making the next gen jump. UNLESS? there were only 10 million xbox owners. So did it break every record known to video game and entertainment history? no really i dont know. if the biggest(not to be mistaken with the best) on the 360 didnt move that many consoles then............ you know?

Please Shut and play with your Wii/PS3? and Stop hating. You will have to recognize that halo just doubled sales from last month. I care what you think, any way you put it, it still doubled sales from last month. And Halo 3 will be the number 1 selling game during Oct and December. I dont know about November, because of Mass Efect and UT3 coming out, but it will be up there in the top 4.

Wow!I didn't think that would happen...Then again I didn't think the Wii was going to do so good. Hahaha! Maybe I don't think.

My predictions for October:

The most overlooked thing is the length of reporting period. September was 35 days, while October is 28, so expect things to drop a bit from last month.

Halo 3 & Orange box @ 1 & 2 (will be close, if not positions switched).

Wii systems still supply constrained for the most part...sales will be mid 400's partly due to retailers/Nintendo stocking up for the Christmas.

360 drops to high 300's -- halo 3 still moving some systems.

PS3 gets a very nice sales boost from the price drop and ends up around 200k (+/- 10%)

You got to be kidding if you think the orange box is going to sell more than teh halos 3 in october. Come on, think about it for a minute. Its Halo 3 man, WTF!!. I predict Halo 3 sales to be in the top 4 until Feb. Except in november, because of mass effect and COD4.

Does this represent world wide sales? Because Video game chartz has Nintendo still the console leader world wide. Or is this chart only for America, I am not sure. But it wouldn't surprise me that xbox360 beat out the WII in American sales, they just have more games those types of gamers want.

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September NPD: Xbox 360 takes the lead, Halo 3 to thank

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