2011 Game Sales Chart and Sales Trends

4Gamer has posted a detailed look at game sales in 2011, complete with charts based off internal data and data from Media Create.

This chart shows month by month hardware sales for the year(covering January 3, 2011 through January 1, 2012). 3DS is shown in light purple, with a massive holiday spike taking it to 1.6 million units sold in December.

Here's the month-by-month sales data for the year. You can see PSP go approach death.

Here's Media Create's top 30 software chart for the year.

• 01: [3DS] Mario Kart 7 (Nintendo): 1,160,169
• 02: [3DS] Super Mario 3D Land (Nintendo): 1,080,192
• 03: [3DS] Monster Hunter 3G (Capcom): 985,498
• 04: [PSP] Final Fantasy Type-0 (Square Enix): 746,203
• 05: [PS3] Final Fantasy XIII-2 (Square Enix): 704,236
• 06: [PSP] Monster Hunter Portable 3rd (Capcom): 682,651 (4,532,557)
• 07: [Wii] Rhythm Heaven: 654,403
• 08: [PS3] Tales of Xillia (Namco Bandai): 627,346
• 09: [NDS] Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 2 Professional (Square Enix): 602,664
• 10: [Wii] Wii Sports Resort Wiimote Plus Pack (Nintendo): 579,220 (802,974)
• 11: [Wii] Wii Party (Nintendo): 546,738 (2,223,629)
• 12: [Wii] Kirby Wii (Nintendo): 537,128
• 13: [3DS] Zelda Ocarina of Time 3D (Nintendo): 483,432
• 14: [PSP] Dissidia Duodecim Final Fantasy (Square Enix): 465,198
• 15: [PS3] Dynasty Warriors 7 (Tecmo Koei): 455,996
• 16: [Wii] Just Dance Wii (Nintendo): 453,411
• 17: [PS3] Gundam Extreme VS (Namco Bandai): 453,084
• 18: [3DS] nintendogs+cats (Nintendo): 443,400
• 19: [NDS] Pokemon Black & White: 433,876 (5,400,613)
• 20: [PS3] Winning Eleven 2012 (Konami): 425,771
• 21: [PSP] 2nd Super Robot Taisen Z Hakai-hen (Namco Bandai): 423,972
• 22: [PS3] Yakuza Of the End: 416,050
• 23: [PS3] Monster Hunter Portable 3rd HD Version (Capcom) 415,943
• 24: [Wii] Dragon Quest Collection (Square Enix): 403,953
• 25: [PSP] Phantasy Star Portable 2 Infinity (Sega): 376,534
• 26: [3DS] Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask (Level-5): 361,503
• 27: [PS3] Dark Souls (From Software): 353,549
• 28: [PSP] AKB1/48 If I Loved an Idol in Guam (Namco Bandai): 350,350
• 29: [NDS] Atsumete! Kirby (Nintendo): 349,899
• 30: [PSP] Little Battler eXperience (Level-5): 346,608

This last chart shows game-by-game buying trends. The horizontal axis is age, lower age to the left and greater age to the right. The vertical axis is spending cash, less money below, more money above.

Different from the charts you see above, this is based off 4Gamer data. The site conducted a survey of its readers from August through September. The survey reached 17,648 people.

Just looking at the colors alone, you can see some clear trends. Xbox 360 games (in green) are purchased by higher age groups with more available money. PSP and PS3 (both in dark blue) are all over the chart, but many of their biggest games were bought by lower age groups with less money to spend. DS and 3DS, both in orange, trended to the higher age groups in Media Crete's sample data, presumably due to the high initial price of the 3DS

In terms of specific games, we see Gal Gun (Xbox 360), Otomedeus (Xbox 360) and Dream Club Zero (PSP) to the upper right. The lower left includes games like Taiko Drum Master DX (PSP) and Puyo Puyo!! (DS). Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep Final Mix (PSP) and Dissidia Duodecim Final Fantasy (PSP) are also in the lower left box. Catherine (PS3), Atelier Meruru (PS3), Akiba's Trip (PSP), Gloria Union (PSP) and LittleBigPlanet 2 (PS3) are right in the middle.

4Gamer has additional charts based off its own data. Access the 4gamer story to see for yourself.