EA and Battlefield dominate March

The value of the UK games software market fell in March by seven per cent year-on-year, according to ELSPA/GfK Chart-Track.

The monthly charts show that EA’s Battlefield: Bad Company 2 was the biggest selling title of the month, followed by Final Fantasy XIII and Ubisoft’s evergreen hit Just Dance.

These blockbuster releases couldn’t reverse the downward trend the industry is seeing in sales of boxed games. MCV revealed last week that UK sales had fallen 7.8 per cent for the entire of Q1. However, games still made 303 million during the period.

EA was the dominant publisher of the month. The company took a 17.5 per cent of the market in March in terms of units and 18.2 per cent share in terms of value.

Square Enix also shot up the publisher rankings courtesy of Final Fantasy and Just Cause 2.

In terms of sales for March by value, 360 was the most successful format, but only just, with PlayStation 3 a mere 0.1 per cent behind it.

But in terms of units of games sold Wii was the leading platform, followed by DS – thanks to the lower average price of Wii and DS titles versus PS3 and 360.