Physical and digital sales combined, the UK video games market is down from £1.934bn in 2011 to £1.598bn in 2012. The market experienced a 17.4 percent dip, according to the ERA.
There is in a small bright spot in the digital space. Sales of digital releases are up 7.7 percent in 2012, growing to £552.2m. Despite the fact that digital video game sales are experiencing a slow trend upwards, it is the most valuable entertainment sector in the UK.
It should be noted that most titles are still being sold in physical form, but digital games are making an impact. 65.4 per cent of the 2012 video games market was comprised of physical sales, compared to 2011’s 73.5 percent.
But even with support from digital, the overall market is slumping. Physical video games are at a lukewarm £1.05bn.
Those who pre-order Touch Detective: Funghi’s Big Breed will receive a couple of bonuses. All reserves come with a pouch and Funghi stickers. Photos of the two items are above.
007 Legends hit North American store shelves on December 11. European Wii U owners, however, are still waiting for its arrival.
Right now 007 is without an official, final European release date. When asked about the game’s launch, an Activision representative said it’s coming “later this year, TBC”.
This week’s GameStop deals are as follows:
Pilotwings 64 composer Dan Hess shared a completely random and interesting revelation in an interview with N64 Blog.
Hess told the site that while the team was making the new Pilotwings, one Nintendo executive – who came “with a briefcase chained to his arm” from Japan showed its in-progress work on Super Mario 64. The team took inspiration from the visit, which “served as motivation for us to make Pilotwings 64 as good as we possibly could.”
Hess said:
“One of my fondest memories is of a Nintendo executive flying from Japan, literally with a briefcase chained to his arm, to show our team they’re developing Super Mario 64 game. We were all blown away and it served as motivation for us to make Pilotwings 64 as good as we possibly could.”
Following the announcement of Pikmin 3 at last year’s E3, Shigeru Miyamoto said he wasn’t a huge fan of ditching the timer in Pikmin 2. He hinted that he was pushing for the mechanic’s return with the Wii U game.
In an interview with GamesMaster, Miyamoto once again stated that he wasn’t too big on the idea of removing the timed functionality.
When asked if the Pikmin 3 team had to make some important decisions about the direction of the series prior to development, Miyamoto said:
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