October NPD - US games market grows 18% year-on-year

Tonight's NPD data confirmed that the US games industry grew 18 percent in October compared to last year, up to $1.31 billion from $1.12 billion in 2007.

"The video games industry grew an impressive 18% year-over-year in the first month of the critical fourth quarter," said NPD analyst Anita Frazier.

"With 10-months under its belt, the video games industry is still poised to top $22B in annual sales in 2008."

Frazier noted, however, that handheld sales for the month had shown a decline.

"The sales results are mixed this month, however," she added. "The console portion of the market made significant gains at 26 percent across hardware, software and accessories, while the portable side of the market stalled, declining 14 percent.

"Year-to-date the portable segment of the market is still up 7 percent."

Hardware sales were up 5 percent compared to last year to $494.74 million, while software sales climbed a substantial 35 percent to $696.79 million against the corresponding previous period.

Peripherals were down 8 percent, however, to $120.19 million.