Weekly UK video games market soars

This week’s UK software sales have skyrocketed 198 per cent to 103.1 million. It is comfortably the highest weekly figure of the year and isn’t far off 2008’s Christmas week, when 112.8 million went through UK games retailer’s tills.

Unit sales also leapt up, rising 123 per cent to 3,422,625 games sold.

The highly anticipated arrival of Modern Warfare 2 drove the sales. The game grossed 67.4 million, almost two thirds of the weekly value. Meanwhile, 1.78 million units were snapped up, which was over half of all games sold last week.

Today’s major releases should ensure another good week for games, with Assassin’s Creed II, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Left 4 Dead 2, F1 2009 and LEGO Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues due for release.