Name of Obligation nearly all the time gobbles up year-end gross sales, and Modern Warfare 3 isn’t any exception, in accordance with industry-tracking agency Circana. The sport topped the listing of best-sellers for November, and is the fifth title within the Name of Obligation collection to take action. Nonetheless, recreation and {hardware} gross sales have been in decline general for the month, dropping 7% from 2022. {Hardware} gross sales, particularly, dropped 24% year-over-year.

“November online game content material spending dropped 3% when in comparison with a 12 months in the past, to $4.6 billion,” mentioned Mat Piscatella, Circana’s govt producer for video games reviews. “An 11% decline in Console & Moveable Content material spending was partially offset by 3% development throughout every of the Cellular, Subscription, and ‘PC, Cloud & Non-Console VR’ Content material segments.”

As we famous in October, gaming {hardware} gross sales have been dropping steadily all 12 months, with that month’s gross sales having essentially the most precipitous fall of 23%. Now November seems poised to proceed this development, with a 24% drop in contrast with 2022. This really brings the full variety of {hardware} gross sales for 2023 down -1% in contrast with the year-to-date interval in 2022 — it was 6% in October

Piscatella added, “A main driver of the year-on-year decline in Console & Moveable Content material was the comparable power of the brand new launch slate. November 2022 featured the launches of each God of Warfare: Ragnarök and Pokémon: Scarlet/Violet.”

Circana November 2023: High 20 best-selling video games within the U.S.

An uncommon function of November’s chart is that a number of titles have jumped into the High 20 from a lot decrease on the gross sales charts. Simply Dance 2024 and God of Warfare Ragnarok moved up partially due to vacation gross sales. Equally, Hogwarts Legacy moved again as much as the High 5 due to its launch on Nintendo Change, and Spider-Man: Miles Morales seemingly noticed a spike due to the latest launch of Spider-Man 2.

November’s releases: What’s there and what’s not there

Out of November’s releases, Modern Warfare 3 and Tremendous Mario RPG are the one two that made it into the High 10. Different additions embody Naruto x Boruto: Final Ninja Storm Connections, which admittedly obtained slightly combined evaluations on launch; and Star Ocean: The Second Story R, a rerelease of the primary recreation within the Star Ocean collection, initially launched for the PlayStation in 1998.

Piscatella famous that considered one of October’s late releases hasn’t appeared on the November charts. Alan Wake 2, which not too long ago gained a number of awards at The Recreation Awards (together with Finest Recreation Route), didn’t seem on the October chart attributable to falling after that chart’s reporting interval. Nonetheless, it’s additionally lacking from the November lists. Piscatella notes this could possibly be as a result of Circana doesn’t report on gross sales information from the Epic Video games Retailer, and the sport’s lack of a bodily launch on consoles.

Circana November 2023: Finest-selling video games of the 12 months to this point

The year-to-date rating hints at a doable upset for the tip of 2023: It’s doable, and even seemingly that Hogwarts Legacy could possibly be the best-selling recreation of 2023. This is able to be the primary time in 15 years that the 12 months’s best-selling recreation hasn’t been both a Name of Obligation title or a Rockstar recreation, in accordance with Piscatella’s latest interview with IGN. It’s nonetheless doable that Modern Warfare III might lap Hogwarts Legacy by the tip of the 12 months.