Market research firm The NPD Group will begin providing a version of its Games Industry: Total Consumer Spend Service to track consumer spending for games in several European countries. The NPD Group's U.S. Total Consumer Spend Service offers sales estimates across various video game sales channels including new physical formats sold at retail, social network gaming, used video games, rentals, subscriptions, digital downloads, downloadable content, and mobile games. The service in Europe will focus on measuring channels that are not currently tracked in Europe – basically anything outside of new physical retail sales.
"The new digital distribution channels in video games are not country specific. They are global in nature, which is why NPD is taking its proven, proprietary methodology, developed over a number of years, and applying it to a global perspective," said Anita Frazier, industry analyst, The NPD Group.
The initial rollout will report on Europe's largest video game markets including the United Kingdom, France and Germany. The launch of the service in Europe will later be followed by expansion into major Asian markets.
The service is scheduled to begin with the tracking of fourth quarter 2011 (Oct.-Dec.) sales.
Source: NPD Group
