374k US Wii MotionPlus sales in June

By Tom Bramwell Published 17 July, 2009

But NPD data shows big year-on-year drops.

Year-on-year sales of consoles and games were down considerably in the US this June, according to the latest NPD data, but Nintendo managed to sell more than a million units of DS and Wii combined and MotionPlus made an impressive impact.

The Wii remote add-on, which launched on 8th June, sold 374,000 units in bundles with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10, Grand Slam Tennis and as a standalone accessory, despite the fact its arguable standard-bearer, Wii Sports Resort, is still a week away.

That presumably helped the Wii rack up its 361,700 sales, which is an improvement on last month's 289,500, while Xbox 360 sold 240,600, up from 175,000 in May, and PS3 also made a modest gain, selling 164,700 compared to 131,000 last month.

Inevitably though the DS powered ahead of everything else with 766,500, up more than 100,000 sales since last month. Nintendo subsequently said 424,000 of those were DSi sales while its predecessor did 342,000. Overall hardware sales were still down a whopping 38 per cent year-on-year, mind you.

Software sales, meanwhile, were down 29 per cent year-on-year, with Activision's Prototype doing the most business - the Xbox 360 version sold 419,900 units. UFC 2009 for 360 was second with 338,300, followed by a trio of Wii titles - EA Sports Active (289,100), Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 (272,400) and Wii Fit (271,600).

The sixth-to-tenth most popular games in June were Fight Night Round 4 on 360 (260,800), the same game on PS3 (210,300), Mario Kart Wii (202,100), Red Faction: Guerrilla on 360 (199,400) and PS3 exclusive inFamous (192,700).

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (18) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Teamallstar #1 3 years ago

    At what point will Sony realise that they need to do something to prevent the PS3 from
    falling into further obscurity than it already has!

    I cannot believe that they haven't reduced the price yet. They are being outsold by their closest rival almost 2 to 1!

    How long will it be before one of the big publishers, EA or acti-blizzard decide that it is no longer worth developing for the playstation?
    Edited by Teamallstar at 17/07/09 @ 09:28

  • Dizzy #2 3 years ago

    "I cannot believe that they haven't reduced the price yet. They are being outsold by their closest rival almost 2 to 1! "

    Maybe they have no desire to suffer a big loss? Maybe they are quite happy to settle for 3rd place and make money? The GC did that last time.... Sony only has to be careful to not lose their fanbase when next gen comes around.
    Edited by Dizzy at 17/07/09 @ 09:31

  • NotSoSlim #3 3 years ago

    As Dizzy stated Sony want to make money, simple. They are doing what they set out to do establishing Blu Ray.

    Also those companies wont stoip developing on PS3 mainly due to the install base the console has at this high price. Price drop will increase install base so why alienate 30m plus gamers??

  • Dizzy #4 3 years ago

    "DIZZY do you honestly think SONY are happy with its market share in the us and will settle for a distant 3rd place"

    I am sure they are not happy... but I was just suggesting that taking a big loss might be worse than market share at the moment for Sony. They seem to pinning their hope on a long cycle and that they will - in the end- sell quite a respectable number of PS3s. It does seem like the 360 is very popular at the moment...
    Edited by Dizzy at 17/07/09 @ 10:30

  • canIdoyabombsforya #5 3 years ago

    @dizzy
    Sony lost billions, they are not making money and Blu-ray sales last year were dire compared to Sony's own predictions.
    I reckon Sony are prolonging the perceived higher status of the PS3 with the price, a price cut will have the biggest affect on the school playground. I think they are still confident the PS3 will end up in most kids bedrooms, remember they have a '10 year plan' this time around. Can't wait to see how the next gen + PS3 pans out.

  • SpaceMidget75 Verified Senior Software Developer, Minerva Computer Services #6 3 years ago

    I agree with Dizzy. I now firmly believe Sony will just try to ride this through and not make a huge loss. I also think that there's an element of them believing their own hype about the '10 year plan'. Long term plans are fine when you have the biggest selling console! They're a little bit harder to realise when you need to release your next console (PS4?) and your current one isn't sitting under the TV of every other home. (GC, XBOX) ;)

    What is also interesting after Bobby Kotick's comments last month is that Prototype sold huge numbers on 360 compared to the PS3. Now, we know that's partly because of the PS3 having its own 1st Party title, but Kotick just cares about profits and he has far more info at his fingers than we do.

    I'm still not saying I agree or that he would do it though.

    Edited by SpaceMidget75 at 17/07/09 @ 12:04

  • secombe #7 3 years ago

    Fantastic numbers for M+, EA must be laughing.

  • Invisible_Cow #8 3 years ago

    I can only hope that eventually Sony realise that in these modern times, the size of the user base really does affect the value of a system. Most people only purchase one console, and most people want to play with friends, so there's a massive network effect going on here which means that once a system gets ahead, it's unlikely to lose the lead. Giving MS a year's headstart -even ignoring the superiority of Live- has now proven to be a massive mistake.

  • Teamallstar #9 3 years ago

    It is laughable how badly Playstation is doing at the moment.

    The wii is not really in the same category as the Xbox or PS3. It is a toy for small children and parents 40+. I personally don't count the numbers as it is like including sales figures for My Little Pony or Telllitubies toys.



  • cyber_nicco #10 3 years ago

    Several people here seem to believe it is good for Sony to sell fewer consoles in order to lose less money...

    Sony was aware that they would be selling their console (hardware) at a loss. The only way to make that economically feasible is to make up the money on games, peripherals, etc. This requires a LARGER installed base, not a smaller one. Furthermore, economies of scale would suggest that selling MORE consoles would only help in reducing manufacturing costs.

    Of course, it seems like some of you are suggesting that Sony is so bad off that they are happy to have the reduced sales for now because they just can't weather the per console hardware losses. If that is the case, why don't they limit themselves more? Maybe only manufacture only 50,000 consoles a month? Maybe none?

    Really, you guys are trying to polish a turd (the news, not the console) here...
    Edited by cyber_nicco at 17/07/09 @ 15:17

  • SpaceMidget75 Verified Senior Software Developer, Minerva Computer Services #11 3 years ago

    No, I'm pretty sure what Sony expected was to be the lead system in a booming economy and hold onto a £425 price tag for much much longer. Dropping the price when they did meant they were losing even more money than they expected to. So now they're re-adjusting as you'd expect them to.

  • smelly #12 3 years ago

    "Sony only has to be careful to not lose their fanbase when next gen comes around. "

    Next gen - i'm ditching microsoft and going back to sony. Fed up with badly made systems. So by me not wanting to spend that money on a console, they've actually gained me as a customer next gen..

    i'll keep buying nintendo though - they seem to be the only company making fun games at the moment

    Edited by smelly at 17/07/09 @ 21:05

  • smelly #13 3 years ago

    @Teamallstar : You'd know all about telytubbie toys wouldnt you? As you sound like a small child.

  • electrolite #14 3 years ago

    "The wii is not really in the same category as the Xbox or PS3....I personally don't count the numbers"

    Oh well, then them sales aren't real are they?

    That's brilliant. One of the funniest posts I've seen on here in a while. Redefining denial.

  • Quixz #15 3 years ago

    @electrolite

    Thinking that the wii is in the same category as the Xbox or PS3 is the funniest post i ever read.

    Edited by Quixz at 18/07/09 @ 05:57

  • electrolite #16 3 years ago

    @Quixz

    They're games consoles. Deny it all you want if it helps you feel better that the console you want to win is selling less than one you don't want to win (I'm not really that bothered tbh) but it doesn;t make it any less true.

    Good grief.

  • Teamallstar #17 3 years ago

    People who own wiis make me laugh. They are 99 times out of 100 non gamers who bought intonthe hype, bought the console thinking it would be great fun and have barely touched the thing in months!

    Wii + uninformed gullable public = £millions for nintendo

  • Invisible_Cow #18 3 years ago

    I don't know anyone (adult) with a Wii who didn't get bored with it after a month. After some promising titles, everything is now being drowned in stuff aimed at kids and mums. The only system worse than the Wii for that is the DS.

    It seems Nintendo have bought into the argument that simple graphics = simple game, which is still sadly prevalent.