The latest NPD report reveals that August was a big month for the video game industry as consumers spent $3.3 billion on video game hardware, software, and accessories. This is a 37% increase compared to August 2019. Mat Piscatella, Executive Director of games at NPD also notes that it was an especially big month for Nintendo as it broke another record and had 5 of the top 10 games for the month.

Nintendo keeps its momentum rolling from the news of its latest financial report which revealed that the company’s profits soared over 500% during the pandemic. This was due, in large part, to the massive success of Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Since the game’s release, it became the fastest-selling game in Japan, the best selling game in the country, and the best selling game in the series.

Nintendo set a new record for August in terms of hardware dollar sales, besting the Nintendo Wii hardware sales record that was set in 2008. The amount of Nintendo Switch consoles that were sold more than doubled the amount when compared to last year.

The 5 games from Nintendo that were part of the best selling games of the month include 5. Animal Crossing: New Horizons, 6. Ring Fit Adventure, 7. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, 8.Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, and 9. Paper Mario: The Origami King.

Talking about Nintendo, Matt Piscatella told GameDaily “And of course, these charts only include physical sales for Nintendo published games, so the feat is even more impressive. Sales of Switch software were positively impacted by the strong hardware performance of course, but most of the Nintendo-published titles on the charts are also of the evergreen sort. Nintendo has had a stellar year in the video game market, with no sign of slowing down anytime soon.” Nintendo recently announced their next big first-party title, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity which will be released on November 20. There are also reports of a new Nintendo Switch model coming out next year.

Matt Piscatella believes that the Switch will continue to lead the hardware sales market in unit sales in 2021. “Nintendo has a long track record and history of releasing new versions of existing hardware. I do not anticipate that stopping with the Switch. What form of those revisions may take I do not know. The one thing I’ve really learned after 15 years in the industry is that making predictions on what Nintendo may do is a fool’s errand.”

Other games in the top 10 for the month of August include 1. Madden NFL 21, 2. UFC 4, 3. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare,  4. Ghost of Tsushima, 10. Mortal Kombat 11.