November video game sales fell 7.6 percent to $2.7 billion compared to $2.9 billion in 2008, according to NPD's latest report. Despite the small slowdown this was actually the industry's second best month for revenues in history and a much bigger month compared to October, helped by the release of a few blockbuster titles.
As expected, software sales were dominated by Activision and Infinity Ward's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. The game moved an astonishing 4.2 million copies during the month on Microsoft's console, while the version for Sony's PlayStation 3 sold 1.9 million. Coming in at a strong but distant second was New Super Mario Bros. Wii with 1.4 million copies, while Assassin's Creed II and Left 4 Dead 2 also made the top sellers list.
On the hardware front, Nintendo was once again the big winner with 1.7 million DS handhelds and 1.3 million Wii consoles sold in November. The Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 grabbed third and fourth spot respectively with 819,500 and 710,400 units sold. In all NPD expects the video games industry – not counting PCs – to rake in $20 billion this year, down slightly compared to last year's record sales of more than $21 billion.