NPD Software: Resident Evil 5 Is the Biggest Game of March

Software sales for March 2009 are 17% lower than those for March 2008, which benefited from the release of Nintendo's Super Smash. Bros Brawl. The overall value of videogame sales is about 792 million dollars and the big title of the month of March is Capcom's Resident Evil 5, which moved close to 1,5 million units. The launch of the zombie shooter has broken all the records for the franchise and the game is also expected to do well in April.

The Xbox 360 version of Resident Evil 5 is in first place, with 938,000 in sales. Second place in the March NPD videogame chart belongs to Pokemon Platinum, created by Nintendo for the DS handheld. The game appeals to a younger audience and has managed to sell 805,000 units in the month when it was officially released.

Surprisingly, Halo Wars, the console real time strategy game that was only released for the Xbox 360, sold 639,000 copies and succeeded in beating the always present Wii Fit.

The Nintendo fitness game was also beaten by the PlayStation 3 version of Resident Evil 5, which sold 585,000 units, while Wii Fit only moved 541,000. MLB 09: The Show from Sony was also well received, selling about 300,000 copies on the PS3, while another exclusive for the Sony console, Killzone 2, moved a somewhat disappointing 296,000 units. Wii Play sits at number eight, followed by Mario Kart for the Wii and MLB 2K9, which closes the top ten with 205,000 in sales.

It's interesting to see that the Nintendo domination of the software charts has been terminated, with an Xbox 360 title getting the top slot, while a PS3 game sits at number four, with the first Nintendo Wii game being at number five.

To sum up, there are three games for each of the big three consoles in the top ten and one title for the Nintendo DS.