Assassin's Creed Shadows sneaks to top of March sales
Despite some controversy leading up to its release, Assassin's Creed Shadows managed to rise to the top of March sales charts in the U.S., according to industry-tracking firm Circana. It was one of several releases that month to make it onto the charts, with Shadows also becoming the second-best-selling game of the year. However, sales in general are still as much in the red as they were last month, with hardware sales being down by 25% just as they were in February.
March 2025 Dollar Sales, Millions March
2024 March
2025 Change Total Video Game Sales $4,985 $4,689 -6% Video Game Content (Physical & Digital Full Game, DLC/MTX and Subscription consumer spending across Console, Cloud, Mobile*, Portable, PC and VR platforms) $4,336 $4,164 -4% Video Game Hardware $382 $286 -25% Video Game Accessories $267 $238 -11% *Mobile spending provided by Sensor Tower
'March video game hardware spending fell 25% when compared to a year ago, to $286 million. This is the lowest March hardware spending total since 2019 ($279M),' said Mat Piscatella, Circana's executive producer for games reports. 'Digital only SKUs have accounted for 75% of Xbox Series and 50% of PlayStation 5 hardware units sold year-to-date.'
As with February 2025, the March 2025 hardware sales are following on March 2024's decline of -32%. It worth noting that hardware sales for the 2023 period were up by a significant percentage (68% in February 2023, 10% in March 2023). The March 2024 hardware decline could be corrective following the 2023 spike, but 2025's continued decline seems to be more indicative of how the current console generation is aging.
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Year-to-Date 2025 Dollar Sales, Millions 2024
YTD 2025
YTD Change Total Video Game Sales $15,102 $13,709 -9% Video Game Content (Physical & Digital Full Game, DLC/MTX and Subscription consumer spending across Console, Cloud, Mobile*, Portable, PC and VR platforms) $13,235 $12,310 -7% Video Game Hardware $1,094 $747 -32% Video Game Accessories $772 $652 -16% *Mobile spending provided by Sensor Tower
Despite the breakthrough success of several of March's titles, overall sales continue to drop. Piscatella noted, 'The only segments showing growth compared to a year ago were non-mobile subscription (+11%) and digital premium downloads on console (+12%). Mobile content spending in the month finished 6% behind March 2024 (mobile source: Sensor Tower).'
Rank Last
Month
Rank Title Publisher 1 NEW Assassin's Creed: Shadows Ubisoft 2 NEW MLB: The Show 25^^ Multiple Video Game Manufacturers 3 1 Monster Hunter Wilds Capcom USA 4 NEW WWE 2K25 Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 5 NEW Split Fiction Electronic Arts 6 6 Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Microsoft (Corp) 7 4 PGA Tour 2K25 Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 8 5 NBA 2K25 Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 9 NEW Bleach: Rebirth of Souls Bandai Namco Entertainment 10 2 Kingdom Come: Deliverance II Plaion 11 11 Minecraft^ Multiple Video Game Manufacturers 12 9 Grand Theft Auto V Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 13 12 EA Sports FC 25 Electronic Arts 14 14 Red Dead Redemption II Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 15 10 Madden NFL 25 Electronic Arts 16 18 Elden Ring Bandai Namco Entertainment 17 NEW Xenoblade Chronicles X* Nintendo 18 NEW Suikoden I & II HD Remaster: Gate Rune & Dunan Unification Wars Konami Digital Ent. 19 13 Marvel's Spider-Man 2 Sony (Corp) 20 16 EA Sports College Football 25 Electronic Arts *Digital sales not included for marked titles^Digital sales on Nintendo platforms not included
^^Digital sales on Nintendo and Xbox platforms not included
A grand total of seven new games have made it onto the March list, the highest number of 2025. These games represent a relatively wide array of genres, from the action-adventure titles like Assassin's Creed Shadows and Hazelight's latest title, Split Fiction; to sports titles like WWE 2K25 and MLB: The Show 25. Bleach: Rebirth of Souls is a fighting game title, while the remaster of the first two Suikoden games made it to the 18th place.
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One game particularly worthy of note on this list is Xenoblade Chronicles X, the remaster of which was released in March as the Definitive Edition. The game originally launched on the unpopular Wii U, so the remaster is reaching a much larger audience. Nintendo doesn't report digital sales to Circana, so its inclusion on the sales charts is based solely off of physical sales. Given this fact, it's impressive that a remaster of a ten-year-old action-RPG made it so high on the list, and could have placed even higher if digital sales were taken into account.
The latest Assassin's Creed game, Shadows, has been the subject of no small amount of discourse prior to its launch. One of the biggest talking points was about how the game's sales would affect Ubisoft. The company admitted that its 2024 title Star Wars: Outlaws had 'softer than expected' sales, and the company laid off 185 people earlier this year. It also reported that it was exploring 'strategic options' with regards to the company's future.
All of which is to say that Ubisoft will be keeping a close eye on Shadows' sales. It recently spun out a new core division of its gaming business that focuses on Assassin's Creed, Far Cry and Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six brands. Tencent invested $1.25 billion in this division last month. Shadows selling particularly well could not only help with Ubisoft's financial situation, but could also demonstrate the franchise's long-term staying power. But it remains to be seen if the sales will actually meet Ubisoft's expectations.
Rank Last
Month
Rank Title Publisher 1 1 Monster Hunter: Wilds Capcom USA 2 NEW Assassin's Creed: Shadows Ubisoft 3 2 Kingdom Come: Deliverance II Plaion 4 NEW MLB: The Show 25^^ Multiple Video Game Manufacturers 5 4 Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Microsoft (Corp) 6 NEW WWE 2K25 Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 7 3 Civilization VII [Sid Meier's] Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 8 5 NBA 2K25 Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 9 6 PGA Tour 2K25 Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 10 NEW Split Fiction Electronic Arts 11 8 Grand Theft Auto V Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 12 10 Minecraft^ Multiple Video Game Manufacturers 13 7 Madden NFL 25 Electronic Arts 14 9 EA Sports FC 25 Electronic Arts 15 11 Red Dead Redemption II Take-Two Interactive (Corp) 16 12 Marvel's Spider-Man 2 Sony (Corp) 17 14 EA Sports College Football 25 Electronic Arts 18 16 Hogwarts Legacy Warner Bros. Games 19 20 Elden Ring Bandai Namco Entertainment 20 13 Avowed Microsoft (Corp) ^Digital sales on Nintendo platforms not included
^^Digital sales on Nintendo and Xbox platforms not included
As stated above, Assassin's Creed Shadows soared to 2nd place on the year-to-date list. It's not the only March title to make it to this list, especially as 2025's titles start to displace last year's titles. Hazelight's Split Fiction took 10th place, while sports titles MLB: The Show 25 and WWE 2K25 took 4th and 6th place, respectively. All of these games have the appeal of previous games backing them up — franchise recognition in the case of WWE 2K, MLB: The Show and Assassin's Creed, and critically acclaimed previous games from the studio in the case of Split Fiction.
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