A statement by the Association for United Kingdom Interactive Entertainment (or UKIE) has revealed an overall drop of 13% on game and hardware spending in the UK in 2011.
The figures are not all negative, with fourth quarter growth accounting for a staggering 51% of annual revenue. That was in no small part due to eight of the ten highest grossing software titles being released within this period.
These titles included the record smashing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, which sold over two million units in only five days, making £83 million in the week of its release.
Given these figures, it is clear that games publishers will continue to push Triple A releases towards Christmas, as sales at that time of year continue to dominate.
Sales for console video game software came to a total of £1.35 billion, with hardware generating £646 million in sales and console/PC accessories chipping in another £453 million.
The console/PC accessory market was amongst the worst hit; selling an estimated 17% less units, despite seeing a massive surge in the popularity of motion control devices. So people are spending less on third party peripherals (down 27% on 2010's revenue), but they like motion capture technology (which accounts for 27% of the console accessory market).
Despite the low figures, much of this was to be expected when considering the current financial climate. Andy Payne, UKIE Chairman, said: "In a year when overall consumer spending was down, 2011 proved to be a better than expected year for the UK's boxed-product games market. Helped by the launch of many top quality titles, particularly in quarter four, total software sales of £1.42bn was better than many predicted."