Retail News, Tips, Tricks & Ideas

GAME staff have reportedly been told to expect a wave of redundancies as employees are moved to zero hours contracts.

In April, the Nintendo Switch moved 251,000 units across standard, Lite, and OLED models in Japan.

GameStop shares are trading up sharply this week after meme stock personality Keith Gill, also known as Roaring Kitty, made his first social media post on Twitter/X in almost three years Sunday night.

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Xbox head Phil Spencer has said that he wants to see more digital retailers on the console, such as the Epic Games Store and Itch.io.

GameStop has reportedly made another round of layoffs, with an unspecified number of jobs lost following lower fourth quarter revenue and low consumer spending.

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A year after being removed from Steam, Ironmace's Dark and Darker will be available on the Epic Games Store.

Players can now buy games via Robot Cache and play them 'almost instantly' as they download.

When GamesIndustry.biz reports on Circana, it's usually the tracking firm's reports on US consumer spending in the past month. But when we speak with Circana analyst Mat Piscatella, out first question is about what he sees happening in the months to come.

Nintendo has confirmed that Octopath Traveler's delisting on the eShop is temporary.

Xbox head Phil Spencer has clarified that Microsoft will continue to support physical media.

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Momotaro Dentetsu World: The Earth Spins with Hope is back at the top of the Japanese monthly charts following its launch last November.

ID@Xbox has launched a curated program to highlight the top indie games on its platform.

This Week in Business is our weekly recap column, a collection of stats and quotes from recent stories presented with a dash of opinion (sometimes more than a dash) and intended to shed light on various trends. Check every Friday for a new entry.

UK specialty retailer GAME is going to drop its second-hand game sales, according to Eurogamer.

Dragon Quest Monsters: The Dark Prince topped the Japan charts in its debut month.

EA Sports FC 24 has continued its hold at the top spot, making it the best-selling game in the 2023 UK retail charts heading into Christmas.

Newzoo has maintained its games market forecast for 2023 to remain at $184 billion in its annual review.

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Ubisoft's Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora had to settle for No.5 in its debut week, with EA Sports FC 2024 still holding the top spot.

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Bandai Namco are continuing to expand their stores in the UK by opening three more this month.

EA Sports FC 24 remained at the top of the UK boxed charts this week, followed by Hogwarts Legacy despite a slight decrease in sales for both titles.

PlayStation is removing purchased Discovery television shows from its platform by the end of this month.

EA Sports FC 24 found its way back to the top of the UK charts this Black Friday week, pushing Hogwarts Legacy down to No.2.

A report by the Entertainment Software Association has found that 72% of children in the US want games-related products for Christmas, but only 22% have asked for physical games.

A London tribunal has ruled that a lawsuit filed last year accusing Sony of breaching competition law over store prices will continue, Reuters reports.

Hogwarts Legacy is back at the top of the UK physical charts following its release on Nintendo Switch, plus Black Friday discounting, pushing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 to second place.

Newzoo has lowered its games market forecast for 2023 to $184 billion, a 0.6% increase year-on-year, in its latest report.

Famitsu has released its physical sales data for October, and Super Mario Bros. Wonder unsurprisingly topped the charts in its debut month.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 topped the UK boxed charts this week, pushing Nintendo's reigning title Super Mario Bros Wonder to No.3.

Bandai Namco is planning to open a new store in London, followed by more outlets across the UK.

Bandai Namco has announced it is expanding its retail presence across the UK with an additional London store and «more stores nationally».

Super Mario Bros. Wonder has enjoyed widespread praise from critics and audiences since its release, and as you’d expect from a Mario game, it’s also enjoying commercial success to match. The game debuted strongly in the UK’s weekly retail charts upon its release, while last week, it climbed into the charts’ top spot. This week, as noted by GamesIndustry’s Christopher Dring on social media platform X, the game has held on to the top spot (though its physical sales are apparently still “quite low”.).

Want to submit a question for the WoW Q&A? Here's where to submit your questions for both the retail and classic Q&As! Retail Q&AClassic Q&A

Game masters looking to add something truly striking to their collection can sign up starting Tuesday for the BackerKit campaign for Monte Cook Games’ Invisible Sun, the now legendary tabletop role-playing game that comes packaged in a 30-pound black cube.

The Apple Vision Pro launch is said to happen in early 2024, but it will not be easy for customers to acquire one as the device is said to be available through an appointment system only. Also, the company has been extremely mum on the product, which only means that the average person does not know what they will be getting for their hard-earned $3,499, and that may be why Apple has selected a few retail employees to undergo a secret training event prior to the release of the AR headset.

Apple has a mechanism that will allow it to update an iPhone while it is still inside its box. If you have an iPhone, you might remember updating it right after you unboxed it. The company has now found a way through which it can update the iPhone to the latest iOS software version while it remains inactive and inside the box. It is amazing to see how the company has pulled updating an iPhone off while it is still inside its sealed retail packaging.

As we’re all gradually coming to terms with, physical media is on the way out. The video games market is slowly transitioning to digital sales, and the switch has occurred even more abruptly in other industries, where most people prefer to stream movies and music these days. Best Buy, one of the United States’ largest retailers, is allegedly planning to phase out all physical media next year.

With the release of Intel's 14th Gen Raptor Lake Refresh closing in, European & Asian retailers have started to list the CPUs early on.

A new Forza Motorsport comparison video was shared online today, putting footage from the reveal trailer and the PC retail version of the game at max settings side by side, highlighting the differences.

The Gfk has released its latest charts for weekly physical software sales in the UK (via GamesIndustry), and to no one’s surprise, EA Sports FC 24 has debuted on top of the charts, as reported previously. Though its physical launch sales are 30% lower than what FIFA 23 managed last year, it’s still the second-biggest launch in the UK for 2023, behind only The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. It has also seen a slight year-on-year increase on the Switch in terms of physical launch sales. 

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Datamining has revealed that the Retail Arfus pet drops from the Headless Horseman in Scarlet Monastery!Arfus has been datamined on the PTR with the drop location listed as:

A new Feat of Strength achievement and the Arfus Pet have now been decrypted in Retail WoW!

Mortal Kombat 1 was the biggest new release of last week, and to no one’s surprise, it seems that the game has got off to a strong start where its sales are concerned. As per Gfk data for weekly physical software sales in the UK, shared by GamesIndustry’s Christopher Dring on Twitter, Mortal Kombat 1 debuted on top of the charts. Its physical launch sales are down 38% from what Mortal Kombat 11 managed upon its launch in 2019, but physical sales trending downward is no surprise for any game at this point.

The Gfk has released the latest data for weekly physical software sales in the UK (via GamesIndustry), and the biggest new release of last week, The Crew Motorfest, has seen a decent debut. The open world racer sits in second place, which is the same position The Crew 2 debuted in when it launched in 2018. Its physical launch sales, however, are about a third of the 2018 game, as per GI.biz’s Christopher Dring on Twitter– though it’s worth keeping in mind that its digital share is likely to be much higher. 

This week in WoW, Blizzard is looking forward to the release of Icecrown Citadel in Wrath of the Lich King Classic on October 12th! Upcoming retail events include Pirate's Day, Shadow-Pan Showdown, and Brewfest on September 20th.

Starfield has topped the weekly retail game sales chart in the United Kingdom, according to GamesIndustry.biz head Christopher Dring, who explained that the figure is particularly impressive because Xbox sales tend to skew heavily toward digital. According to Dring, when adding in Game Pass, Starfield could be the biggest launch of the year in terms of player counts in the United Kingdom.

Hogwarts Legacy has jumped back to the top of the weekly charts for physical software sales in the UK, as per data provided by the Gfk (via GamesIndustry). The open world action RPG enjoyed boosted sales on all platforms thanks to a retailer promotion, with the PS5 version seeing a 266% increase in sales from last week, and the Xbox Series X version seeing a 249% boost. Collectively, all versions of the game enjoyed a 228% increase in sales.

The retail WoW Token gold price has hit record highs in nearly all regions over the last month with little relief in sight. Let's explore recent and historical WoW token data to determine if players could see relief anytime soon.

Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon continued the glut of excellent new releases with its launch last week, and unsurprisingly, has got off to a solid start. As per data released by the Gfk for physical software sales in the UK (via GamesIndustry), FromSoftware’s mech action game was the highest-selling title in the region last week. 64% of all physical copies were sold on the PS5. 

PS5 games were once again in control of the UK boxed charts this week, thanks to summer sales and price bundling.

The AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE GPU is a weird product that is only available outside of China through select system integrators. As such, the graphics card has recently started to show up within listings by EU retailers.

The first AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE 16 GB GPU designs have been revealed by AIBs such as XFX, PowerColor & Sapphire. In addition to AIBs, the first system integrators have also started to ship their PCs equipped with GPUs worldwide.

First rumoured, and now apparently confirmed, it seems Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name will be released digitally in the West on PS5 and PS4, with SEGA all but erasing our hopes for a physical release.

Xbox has reportedly started issuing temporary suspensions to players who use emulators in retail mode.

Apple is now preparing to offer home delivery services from retail stores for customers to make hassle-free purchases. This will not only help customers but also Apple employees to store space for holding large bulk of the devices.