Digital claims just 4% of UK market

The rise of digital games sales is destroying High Street and ruining an entire sector. Or not.

According to numbers from GAME’s half-year financial report, digital video games revenues accounted for just four per cent of the total market for the first half of the year. The statistic comes from official UK stats body GfK Chart-Track.

"It is easy to overstate the magnitude and speed of that change – consumers still overwhelmingly prefer to buy video games as physical boxed product and the view of our industry is that this is likely to remain the case for some time,"chief executive Ian Shephard stated.

"As Sony Computer Entertainment CEO Kaz Hirai recently said (in an exclusive interview with MCV), ‘To think everything will be downloaded in two years, three years or even ten years from now is taking it a little bit to the extreme’."

Nonetheless, GAME still intends to do all it can to grab as large a slice as possible of the growing sector and plans to tie-in its online and store operations even further.

"However, even as we are cautious about the speed with which the ‘download revolution’ will happen, we must be bold in preparing for it," Shepherd added.

"GAME has made investments this year in a wide range of new technologies including mobile apps, digital downloading on the web and even a presence directly in the ‘virtual malls’ on consoles themselves.

"Fundamentally, we believe that the strength of our customer relationships and our brand position as an expert and trusted retailer give us strength in those emerging channels and our investment in them will continue."