According to a report published by the Entertainment Retailers Association, digital sales in the U.K. are on the up and up, with 2012 marking the highest levels yet. Last year, more than £1 billion was spent on digital music, video, and games. The figure – roughly £1.033 billion – is an 11.4% increase on the same sales in 2011, and accounts for around a quarter of the entertainment market. While three quarters of the market is still made up of disc sales, it's clear digital is making a strong bid to take over. Will we one day see three quarters of entertainment sales accounted for by digital, with discs only making up a small proportion?
As for what money there is in video games compared to the other two forms of media, more than half of that total figure is attributed to games. Most of the £552.2 million in digital sales of video games is said to come from Massive Multiplayer Online Games, social gaming, and online console transactions, so it seems the money in digital is to be found in things like DLC and Facebook rather than the PlayStation Store, which is unsurprising given the higher prices of digital versus retail when it comes to full titles.
Despite the growth in digital sales, however, the entertainment market as a whole is said to be in decline, with combined sales down 12% from last year. And video games have suffered the largest decrease, down 17.4%. Could the release of a new console help things along? Or is the proliferation of cheaper, “casual” games over more expensive “hardcore” titles bringing combined sales down?
