Five Years of Christmas Charts of Best Selling Video Games

Analysis of the UK’s Christmas charts of the top selling video games for five years.

	2015	2014	2013	2012	2011
1.	Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 Activision	Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare Activision	FIFA 14        EA Games	Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2 Activision Blizzard	The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Bethesda
2.	Star Wars: Battlefront EA Games	Fifa 15 EA Games	Call of Duty: Ghosts Activision	Far Cry 3 Ubisoft	Just Dance 3 Ubisoft
3.	Fifa 16 EA Games	Grand Theft Auto 5 Rockstrar	Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag Ubisoft	Hitman Absolution Square Enix Europe	Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Activision
4.	Fallout 4 Bethesda	Far Cry 4 Ubisoft	Battlefield 4 EA Games	Fifa 13 Electronic Arts	FIFA 12 EA Games
5.	Minecraft: Story Mode Telltale Games	Assassin's Creed: Unity Ubisoft	LEGO Marvel Super Heroes Warner Bros Interactive	Just Dance 4 Ubisoft	Saints Row: The Third THQ
6.	Assassin's Creed: Syndicate Ubisoft	The Crew Ubisoft	Grand Theft Auto V Rockstar	Need For Speed Most Wanted Electronic Arts	Battlefield 3 EA Games
7.	Just Cause 3 Square Enix	Destiny Activision	Just Dance 2014 Ubisoft	Assassin's Creed 3 Ubisoft	Assassin's Creed: Revelations Ubisoft
8.	Grant Theft Auto 5 Rockstar	Minecraft: Xbox One Edition Microsoft	Need for Speed: Rivals EA Games	Halo 4 Microsoft	Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games Sega
9.	Tom Clancy?s Rainbow Six Siege Ubisoft	Minecraft: PlayStation Edition Sony Computer Entertainment	Killzone Shadow Fall Sony	Lego The Lord Of The Rings Warner Bros. Interactive	Need for Speed: The Run EA Games
10.	Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection Sony	LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment	Minecraft Xbox 360 Edition Microsoft	WWE '13 THQ	Professor Layton and the Spectre's Call Nintendo

GfK Chart-Track has published 2015 Christmas week’s chart of the best selling video games in the UK. The results have been expected with great interest by many. Of course, Christmas week is just one of the 52 weeks in the year, not particularly different than the previous week, or the following one, but many publishers and developers love to see their games appear in the Christmas chart. Christmas week is not even the biggest one in terms of sales, there are usually at least several weeks in a year that see significantly larger sales, for example the Black Friday week, or the weeks when some big titles are releasing, such as Call of Duty, Fifa, and a few other titles.

Since there is a lot of interest for Christmas week charts, we thought it would be interesting to have a look at the historic data of the Christmas charts in the UK in recent years, to analyse, and find some trends. For example what franchises have been most successful in the recent years? Who have developed and published the most successful games? To find answers on these and some other questions, we have looked at the UK’s Top 10 charts of recent years, from 2011 to 2015, please see the table above.

Top Games

The above games were number one in the Christmas charts from 2011 to 2015. Call of Duty Advanced Warfare was on top not only on Christmas week but also has been on the top for the most time of the year, starting from November 2014 to November 2015 when Call of Duty Black Ops 3 released, which is currently on top of the chart. Fifa 15 has done very well too, after its release in September 2015 it has been in the top most of the time. Year 2013 was also mostly a Call of Duty year, with Ghost on top of the charts for most of the year, although Fifa 14 has managed to top the chart on the Christmas week. In previous year, Fifa 13 was less successful and ended on the fourth position. It was Far Cry 3 to compete with Call of Duty Black Ops 2 for the crown on Christmas 2012. The top of 2011 chart was quite different from recent ones though, with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Just Dance 3 on top.

Top Franchises

Three franchises, Call of Duty, Fifa, and Assassin’s Creed have been in the top 10 all five years. Call of Duty appears to be the most successful game for Christmas, in all five years it was in the top 3 position. Fifa is the next successful game, appearing three times in the top 3 in five years, and Assassin’s Creed has only once. Other titles that appeared in the chart most of all include Minecraft, GTA 5, Need for Speed, Just Dance, and Lego series.

   

Most Successful Publishers

The most successful publisher was Ubisoft, with its games appearing in top ten charts 12 times during the last five years. The next successful publisher was Electronic Arts, with 11 appearances in top ten chart, and the third was Activision with six appearances.

   

Most Successful Developers

The most successful game developer was Ubisoft Montreal with their games appearing six times in the top 10. Next was EA Canada with four appearances in the top 10 during five years. The third most successful developer was Rockstar North, with Grand Theft Auto 5 appearing three times in Top 10. GTA 5 released three years ago, has been in top 10 ever since, and is the most successful long seller in the charts.

Christmas week’s top chart is a snapshot of the results at that moment and is not cumulative. It is more interesting to have a look at analysis of the yearly total results, and we are planning to do this soon.

Related Topics: Christmas, Video game charts

Comments are closed.

---