Black Friday is that magical time of year when deals pop up left and right while consumers spend... Or maybe not so, considering the latest data from GfK that reveals that physical video game sales in the UK went down by 15% during this momentous occasion. We also have to consider that last year's sales were down 10% over the year before.
Now, when we talk about the data presented by the GtK study (first reported by Gamesindustry.biz), it's important to mention that this only covers UK sales and boxed game sales. The data doesn't include digital sales that happened over Black Friday week. It also doesn't include console sales data.
This week also saw a decline in sales for Pokemon Scarlet/Violet. Both games dropped 64% in sales week-on-week, which is a reasonable number for a Pokémon game. Last year's Pokémon titles dropped around 58% in their second week (and from a smaller base), while Pokémon Legends: Arceus, released in January this year, fell 72%.
The best-selling boxed game of the week was FIFA 23, with sales up 95%. In the second position, we have Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, whose sales rose 9%, despite the game not receiving a significant discount. Sonic Frontiers is one of the games that benefitted from this year's Black Friday deals. The game, which was only recently released, was reduced in price to just over £30 during Black Friday. As a result, the Sega platform game rose 203% in sales and is up to No.7 in the GfK rankings.
Just Dance 2023, which recently made its debut, has performed really well. In fact, it became the No. 9 entry in the ranking, with launch sales becoming 173% bigger than what Just Dance 2022 managed. 83% of the Ubisoft game's sales were on Nintendo Switch.
Speaking of the Nintendo Switch games, they have shown good performance during Black Friday. Nintendo Switch Sports (No.8) enjoyed a sales rise of 138%, Animal Crossing: New Horizons (No.10) is up 85%, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (No.11) jumped 426%. Meanwhile, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe jumped to No.5 after a 226% increase in sales, maintaining its strong presence during the holiday.
Data surrounding digital and console sales will be available in the future. Make sure to stay tuned for when it does.
News Source: Gamesindustry
