Worldwide games sales overtake films for the first time

Games take 53% of packaged media market

View more images

26 January 2009 18:47 GMT / By Verity Burns

New market research has shown that worldwide video game revenue overtook that of DVD and Blu-ray for the first time ever in 2008.

According to Media Control GfK International, "packaged media commodities" clocked up sales of $61 billion last year, of which games took a 53% share, and DVD and Blu-ray sales took the remaining 47%.

Not just that, the media research group thinks this gap will widen in 2009, predicting games will represent 57% by the end of 2009.

Global sales of video games were reported to rise by 20% in 2008, with sales amounting to $32 billion. The Nintendo Wii has been labelled as a big contributory factor to this sales boost, while the transition from DVD to Blu-ray is being blamed for the 6% fall in sales in that sector, to £29.8 billion.

Overall, packaged media commodities did worse than expected in 2008, climbing just 6% on 2007 when Media Control GfK predicted a 12% rise. The research group has put this down to the poor economic climate over the past year.