2023 may have already come and gone, but it has been a big year for the fighting game community with the arrival of two major new games as well as ongoing support for a host of others.
Circana/the NPD Group recently released their video game sales rankings for December 2023 as well as the full year with both Mortal Kombat 1 and Street Fighter 6 making the cut in the face of some stiff competition.
At the close of the year, the MK1 remained steady in US sales from November to December, finishing eighth overall in terms of money earned.
Top 20 Best-Selling Featured Games of December 2023 – US (Dollar sales, physical and digital from DLP members, excluding additional content) pic.twitter.com/1jxBjMs5LL
– Matt Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) January 18, 2024
What's more, Mortal Kombat remained on PlayStation 5's monthly top list at 11th place, down a few spots from November, but it didn't appear to appear there on Xbox or Steam.
Top 20 most played titles on PlayStation 5 for December 2023 ranked by monthly active users in the US (Source: Circana Player Engagement Tracker) pic.twitter.com/1iOMmcBxd8
– Matt Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) January 18, 2024
Street Fighter 6 didn't show up in the monthly charts, but that's not surprising considering it hasn't charted since August despite appearing frequently in the yearly totals.
When zooming out over the past 12 months, Mortal Kombat 1 actually finished the year in eighth place here too, beating out the likes of Star Wars: Jedi Survivor, EA Sports FC 24, Starfield and Super Mario Bros. Wonder (although the latter does not) (including digital sales) came in just behind Diablo 4 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
Top 20 Best-Selling Premium Games of 2023 – US (Dollar sales, physical and digital from DLP members, excluding add-on content) pic.twitter.com/LR6Za5YQ24
– Matt Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) January 18, 2024
Street Fighter 6 finished the year behind Final Fantasy 16 and Dead Island 2, and while it was technically the last game on that list to actually release last year, it's still an impressive feat for Capcom – especially with Resident Evil 4 also finishing 2023 ranked 13th in the United States
Breaking it down to more platforms, MK1 finished as the 7th best offering on PlayStation systems all year while SF6 finished in 15th place.
Top 20 best-selling premium games of 2023 on PlayStation platforms – US (dollar sales, physical and digital from DLP members, excluding add-on content) pic.twitter.com/VKENys25VX
– Matt Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) January 18, 2024
Interestingly, MK1 charted at #8 on Xbox while SF6 didn't make the cut at all despite Mortal Kombat not appearing on Nintendo's charts at all either.
You know what though? Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is in seventh place for Switch. It may have finally fallen off the main NPD charts last year after nearly 5 years in a row, but that doesn't mean it's completely gone.
Top 20 Best-Selling Featured Games of 2023 on Nintendo Platforms – US (Dollar sales, physical and digital from DLP members, excluding add-on content) pic.twitter.com/U02lhTaXOi
– Matt Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) January 18, 2024
Since this only includes the US, we can't get a full idea of what these numbers actually look like although Capcom recently announced that SF6 has surpassed 3 million sales after hitting 2 million after its first month.
Last we heard, Mortal Kombat 1 also sold around 3 million units in less than a month, and that was before Black Friday and holiday sales – so that number may reach at least 5 or 6 million now despite Warner Bros. not making the cut. I haven't informed the public about that yet.
Overall, it seems as if 2023's main fighters have done very well for themselves, but it will be very interesting to see if that continues into 2024, especially with Tekken 8 and more big games on the horizon in general.
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