March 2019 NPD: The Division 2 jumps over Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice to lead sales chart

The Division 2 shows that Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice isn’t too hard to beat — at least on the sales charts. But for the industry overall, March 2018 trumps March 2019, as total industry spend is down 11% compared to this time last year in the United States, market research firm The NPD Group reported today.

Sales of hardware, software, accessories, and game cards was to $1.2 billion, and NPD said that declines happened in all these segments. This isn’t the case of one or two segments dragging down the market. NPD also reports that a sagging hardware market resulted in a weaker first quarter in 2018 as compared to 2019 — it was $3.2 billion, down 2 percent, and gains in software and other areas couldn’t offset declines from sales of consoles.