When the NPD numbers for December came in it was clear there was only one winner. Sony may take solace in beating out Microsoft and registering their biggest month ever for Playstation 3, but what Nintendo managed was just insane. Both Nintendo DS and Wii beat out the previous best months for any console, and New Super Mario Bros. Wii had a massive second month to claim first spot in the software chart. In fact the entire software chart was dominated by Nintendo who laid claim to the top three positions and six out of the top ten entries. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 continued to register massive numbers in its second month while Assassin's Creed II and Left 4 Dead 2 on Xbox 360 also had very healthy numbers in their second months on the market. In fact no new releases made the list, and that is perhaps the only negative thing Nintendo can note as one would have expected a new Zelda release (The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks) to feature somewhere on the chart.
As a whole the revenue in December was up four per cent over December 2008, which means it was the highest grossing month ever. Some other interesting notes was that the music/dance genre was the highest grossing genre in the month, no such titles in the top ten, but perhaps Guitar Hero and Rock Band managed to claw back some lost sales in the final month of 2009. Madden NFL 09 also had a good month totalling 1.5 million in sales across all platforms in December. As a whole the slight increase in December did not manage to turn things around for the whole year that saw an 8 per cent decline compared to the record breaking 2008.
Software:
1. New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Wii) - 2,820,000
2. Wii Fit Plus (Wii) - 2,410,000
3. Wii Sports Resort (Wii) - 1,790,000
4. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Xbox 360) - 1,630,000
5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (PS3) - 1,120,000
6. Wii Play (Wii) - 1,010,000
7. Mario Kart Wii (Wii) - 936,1000
8. Assassin's Creed II (Xbox 360) - 783,1000
9. Left 4 Dead 2 (Xbox 360) - 728,500
10. Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story (DS) - 656,700
Hardware:
1. Wii 3,810,000
2. Nintendo DS 3,310,000
3. PS3 1,360,000
4. Xbox 360 1,310,000
5. PSP 654,700
6. PS2 333,200