What were the Top 20 best selling games in May 2021 in the United States?
The newest NPD numbers are in, and so are the top lists of the highest selling game systems and games (by revenue) for last month in North America. Including both retail and most digital sales & revenue numbers.
Here is the full Top 20 games of May 2021:
- Resident Evil: Village (NEW)
- MLB: The Show 21**
- Call of Duty: Black Ops: Cold War
- New Pokemon Snap*
- Mortal Kombat 11
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe*
- Returnal
- Animal Crossing: New Horizons*
- Minecraft
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019)
- Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales
- Super Mario 3D World*
- Super Smash Bros. Ultimate*
- It Takes Two
- Biomutant* (NEW)
- Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla
- Monster Hunter: Rise
- The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild*
- Pokemon Sword and Shield*
- Days Gone
* No digital sales included.
** No Xbox digital sales included.
Considering the majority of game sales are digital nowadays, even Nintendo has actually sold 50% more of New Pokemon Snap, likely making it the real #2 or #3 this month. Resident Evil 8: Village was the clear winner and in fact in a single month became the second most sold games of 2021 year-to-date after Call of Duty: Black Ops: Cold War, which has already been for sale since last year, so that’s quite a rise to fame for the latest RE game.
Here’s a Resident Evil 8: Village TV clip…
The Best-selling Games of 2021 so far:
- Call of Duty: Black Ops: Cold War
- Resident Evil: Village (NEW)
- MLB: The Show 21**
- Super Mario 3D World*
- Monster Hunter: Rise
- Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales
- Outriders
- Mario Kart 8*
- Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla
- Minecraft
Video Game System Sales in May 2021:
May 2021 consumer spending across video game hardware, content and accessories increased 3% when compared to a year ago, reaching $4.5 billion. Year-to-date consumer spending totaled $24.0 billion, a 17% increase compared to the same period in 2020.
May performance experienced a return to year-over-year growth following a slight dip in April. Gains in Subscription, Console, PC and VR content spending drove the positive variance. May 2021 hardware sales gained 5% compared to the prior year.
May video game hardware dollar sales increased 5% when compared to May 2020, to $244 million. Year-to-date hardware consumer spending totaled $1.9 billion, a 36% increase compared with a year ago.
Nintendo Switch was the best-selling hardware platform in both units and dollars during the month of May, as well as 2021 year-to-date.
Analysis of the rest of the sales numbers:
NPD tracks retail sales to get a good impression of last month’s best selling video games. Although it doesn’t by far track all digital sales, since April 2018 NPD tracks Steam (PC), Xbox Live, and PlayStation Network for these major third-party publishers: Activision-Blizzard, Capcom, Deep Silver, Electronic Arts, Square Enix, Take-Two Interactive, Ubisoft, and Warner Bros.
To quote NPD analyst Mat Piscatella…
About the top video game sales he said:
Resident Evil: Village was the best-selling game of May 2021. Resident Evil: Village generated the highest launch month sales of any 2021 release to date, and after one month in market the title ranked as the 2nd best-selling game of 2021 YTD.
Resident Evil: Village was the best-selling game of the month on both PlayStation and Xbox platforms, as well as across tracked titles on Steam.
Days Gone was the 20th best-selling game of May 2021, after placing 247th on the April chart. Days Gone was released to the PC platform via Steam on May 17th, 2021.
About video game accessories he said:
May 2021 spending on video game accessories fell 8% compared to a year ago, to $142 million. Year-to-date accessory sales reached $1.0 billion, an increase of 17% when compared to the same period in 2020.
Year-to-date sales of Steering Wheel accessories have gained more than 45% when compared to a year ago. The Logitech G920 Driving Force Racing Wheel is 2021’s best-selling Steering Wheel year-to-date.
Credits: Resetera
Are the Top 20 games what you expected?