2023-08-06 20:42:02
For the past few weeks, it’s been time to take stock of video games. While we were able to see Nintendo’s still exceptional figures, boosted by the event release of Tears of the Kingdom, proving once again that the Switch is one of the most enduring living room machines commercially speaking (even chasing the indecent levels of the PlayStation 2), it is now with more global results that we are dealing with. Indeed, the SELL (Syndicat des Publishers of Leisure Software) has just published its report on the state of the video game market in France for 2022 and, as we suspected, it is doing extremely well.
Nonetheless, the SELL reports to us that the overall turnover (all media combined therefore) of video games in France is in decline by 1.6%, or around 100 million euros less. If the PC ecosystem has experienced a clear revival of form, it is rather at the level of the consoles that this (slight) fall is to be attributed, with a decrease in figure of 6.6%, caused in particular by the difficulty for the large public to purchase new generation machines (-10% in this segment). Finally, let’s be reassured, with a global turnover of more than 5.5 billion, there is really no danger in the remains, especially now that the Xbox Series and PlayStation 5 have become easily accessible..
Moreover, on this juicy market, it is, without much surprise, the video game on console which takes the lion’s share with its 46% market share, the PC and the Mobile sharing the rest equally. And it is now that we will begin to tackle the figures that annoy. Haven’t you heard, in recent weeks, and even for several years in fact, this unpleasant music, where certain “experts” announce to us with great reinforcements of percentages that the physical video game is already dead?
Let’s restore some honor and throw a few banderillas at these received ideas. No, the physical video game is not dead, far from it. So certainly, according to the annual report of the SELL, the dematerialized part accounted for 82% of the total market in 2022. However, if we look more closely, this 82% includes in addition to the console ecosystem, those of the PC and the mobile on which the physical video game is non-existent or almost non-existent. In this case, why include them in this graph whose relevance seems doubtful to us? In our opinion, this gives the wrong signal and pushes to accentuate a trend, by providing well-furnished weapons to the record diggers.
Especially since looking in detail, we see that this trend sold by publishers and manufacturers is not so obvious and marked. Indeed, we can see that the money generated by subscription formulas, such as Game Pass or PlayStation Plus, have fallen by 10% compared to 2021 and that sales of dematerialized video games have fallen by 13%. . As a direct consequence, the physical video game has regained ground in 2022, nibbling 4% compared to its intangible counterpart, therefore now sharing the market at 38% for the materialized against 62%.
It is certainly possible that we are dealing here with a cultural exception, we French being generally more attached to the physical than our English neighbors to name a few, and that this increase in material purchases was probably also allowed by the end of confinements on our territory. Nevertheless, it would be good not to bury the physical too quickly and not to forget that neither of the two is completely better than the other and that it would be good if they lived together… at least, if given the chance.
Moreover, we can also observe that the physical video game is not so much in agony as what we would have us believe when we take a closer look at the best-selling video games of the hexagon. Indeed, the SELL tells us for example that FIFA 23, the best sale of 2022 achieves a score of 1.08 million copies in physical format out of a total of 1.76 million in all (i.e. approximately 61%). And yes, as surprising as it may seem, the physical is the majority for FIFA 23 in 2022. We are far from 90 – 10 in favor of the digital trumpeted here and there.
Same observation for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 with its 414,780 physical copies sold for a total of 791,338 units (52%). We obtain a similar ratio with the GOTY of 2022, Elden Ring, with 51% of the materialized market share (whether in value or in volume). Even its successor, God of War: Ragnarök, presents a ratio extremely in favor of the disc version with almost 75% market share. And yet, from all sides, we hear that physical video games are in the minority…
Once again, it is quite possible that France is an exception, but these SELL figures remain quite edifying as to the feeling that one can have of the market and the reality of the facts. What will happen next year, now that the market has stabilized and the health crisis and shortages are behind us. Under the blows of the editors, will the part of the dematerialized continue its march forward? We will probably already have a first indicator with the very soon release of Alan Wake 2, offered only on digital stores and which will probably send a sign, one way or the other, to a good part of the industry.
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