REVEALED: UK’s best-selling games of 2008

Mario Kart Wii and FIFA 09 lead the way as part of £1.9bn software market

Exclusive end-of-year ELSPA/Gfk-ChartTrack data supplied to MCV has shown that Mario Kart and FIFA were the big winners as part of 2008’s £4bn bonanza we detailed earlier this week.

According to the Top 10s for unit sales of both individual SKUs and the All Formats listing, Nintendo formats drove sales while multiformat efforts from the likes of EA, Activision Blizzard, Rockstar and LucasArts secured glory too.

Mario Kart Wii was the best selling single-SKU of the year, selling continually after its April 2008 release.

In fact five Wii games secured places in that chart – the others were Wii Fit, Wii Play (both Nintendo), Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (Sega) and 2K’s Carnival Funfair.

Meanwhile, in the All Formats 2008 list, EA takes the top spot – no surprise after selling 2m copies in the UK as we revealed earlier today – but Mario Kart isn’t far behind at second.

And there are six titles exclusive to Nintendo formats in that list – Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games, Wii Fit, Wii Play, Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training and Carnival Funfair.

GTA IV, Lego Indiana Jones and Call of Duty: World at War also put in good showings in the top 10s too. (In fact, as these lists are by unit sales rather than value, it’s possible that Activision Blizzard and Rockstar might have trumped the likes of EA in the revenue stakes as their headline games were released at higher-price points on 360 and PS3 – but you’ll have to wait until we publish our full year analysis to find out more about that.)

The full 2008 top tens for individual SKU sales (units) and All Formats (units) are listed below.

2008 TOP 10 – INDIVIDUAL SKUS

1. Mario Kart Wii (Wii) Nintendo
2. Wii Fit (Wii) Nintendo
3. Wii Play (Wii) Nintendo
4. Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training (DS) Nintendo
5. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (Wii) Sega
6. GTA IV (360) Rockstar
7. GTA IV (PS3) Rockstar
8. Call of Duty: World at War (360) Activision
9. Carnival Funfair (Wii) 2K
10. FIFA 09 (360) EA

2008 TOP 10 – ALL FORMATS

1. FIFA 09 EA
2. Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo)
3. GTA IV (Rockstar)
4. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (Sega)
5. Wii Fit (Nintendo)
6. Call of Duty: World at War (Activision)
7. Wii Play (Nintendo)
8. Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training (Nintendo)
9. Lego Indiana Jones (LucasArts)
10. Carnival Funfair (2K)

Source: www.mcvuk.com