The latest NPD Group video game industry report indicates the Microsoft Xbox 360 received a strong sales boost year-over-year due to the new Xbox 360 slim model launch during E3 last month.
Video game software sales declined 15 percent down to $531.3 million, which is a larger sales slide than expected. However, game hardware increased 5 percent up to $401.7 million during June, with the Xbox 360 and PS3 seeing strong year-over-year sales increase.
June proved to be interesting because it's relatively rare to see software sales decline and hardware sales increase, analysts said. Microsoft saw a very strong sales boost after launching the slimmer 250GB Wi-Fi model of the Xbox 360 last month -- and they expects the trend to continue further.
"Unfortunately, the industry realized a decline versus the same time period last year, driven by decreases in sales of portable hardware and console and portable software," said Anita Frazier, NPD analyst, in a statement.
For the second consecutive month, the best selling video game title is Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360 version). Meanwhile through June, the game industry pulled in $6.66 billion, a 9 percent decrease compared to the first half of 2009. However, it's still possible the industry could reach the $20 billion plateau by the end of the year.
The video game industry has been very turbulent as gamers more carefully pick and choose which titles they purchase in a down economy. Game titles consumers would have splurged on five years ago are now sitting on store shelves in many retailers.
Manufacturers and game studios hope custom Xbox 360 Kinect bundles and PS3 Move bundles can help drive sales throughout the year. In addition, lower-priced game consoles and several anticipated game titles will be released in time for the holiday sales season.
