Today games and interactive entertainment trade body, UKIE has launched the “world’s first official digital games chart using actual sales data from PC downloads and Expansion / DLC titles”. The chart includes actual sales data directly supplied by leading games software players such as Electronic Arts, Mastertronic, NCSOFT, Sega, Square-Enix, Take 2, Ubisoft, Warner Bros, Disney, Born Ready Games and other publishers and digital distributors.
This digital chart has been in beta testing for a year before being launched today. Jo Twist, CEO of Ukie commented “As an industry, we need to measure the true size of the digital games market and that’s why we have invested in this system for the industry to own. Companies that are involved are already getting a competitive advantage, using the data to make informed and fact based commercial decisions.”
The charts will initially be available on a monthly basis but will move to a weekly schedule in the future. A combined boxed and digital chart for PC will also be published and separate charts for full and expansion titles will be available for analysis. All contributors to the charts will get free full access to the data portal, showing the breakdown of figures behind the headline numbers, including data “by title, franchise, age rating, developer, units sold and revenue generated, amongst other market indicators”. That should provide very useful market analysis data to all contributors.
Andy Payne CEO of Mastertronic commented “As an independent self publisher and developer who has been selling our games digitally for 9 years, we know that digital is key to our growth. For the very first time it is now possible for us to measure ourselves against the market and this is an amazing and vital step in our evolution as a games maker.”
In this first week of such PC games charts, the top sellers are the following:
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PC boxed & digital game sales combined (Units)
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PC digital game sales (Units)
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The PC digital DLC/expansion game sales revenue figures are dominated by expansion packs for The Sims 3 with six expansions ranking in the top 10.
What about Steam?
UK games industry trade news magazine MCV interviewed Jo Twist of UKIE and asked her about the elephant in the room – “Where is Steam? How can the chart be relevant without Steam?” The answer was that Steam data was collected, verified and audited by the game developers/publishers and supplied to UKIE that way.
Also Twist said the PC chart was chosen first for the digital downloads integration as it is “not only a vibrant and viable format, it's further down the road in making the transition from boxed to digital”. Apparently the systems are in place so that other platforms can be accommodated seamlessly in the near future.
