We will hear official sales/shipment figures soon, too, as the new fiscal year started a little more than two weeks ago, and Sony will have to publish its fiscal report.

The NPD Group released its March report, which unsurprisingly showed high figures. The players in North America spent a total of 5.6 billion dollars on games, hardware, and additional content. This is an 18% year-on-year increase. Although the Nintendo Switch sold the most units, the PlayStation 5 has become the fastest-selling console in US history over its first five months, both in unit and dollar sales. So if there wasn’t a serious lack of units to be sold, the Nintendo Switch might not be taking the first place.

Here’s March’s top 20:

1.      Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
2.      Monster Hunter Rise
3.      Outriders
4.      Super Mario 3D World
5.      Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales
6.      Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
7.      Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
8.      Animal Crossing: New Horizons
9.      Super Mario 3D All-Stars
10. Minecraft
11. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
12. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
13. Pokemon Sword & Shield
14. Mortal Kombat 11
15. Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time
16. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
17. Madden NFL 21
18. NBA 2K21
19. Super Mario Party
20. FIFA 21

The Nintendo Switch took five of the top ten spots, but Super Mario 3D All-Stars only entered this height because it was taken off the shelves at the end of March. The new Monster Hunter debuted in second place; only Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War finished in front of it. Outriders, which launched on April 1, took the bottom step of the podium. Sony has one title in the top 10, namely Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales. Here’s 2021’s top ten so far:

1.      Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
2.      Super Mario 3D World
3.      Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales
4.      Monster Hunter Rise
5.      Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
6.      Mario Kart 8
7.      Minecraft
8.      Madden NFL 21
9.      Animal Crossing: New Horizons
10. Outriders

A multiplatform, a Nintendo Switch-, and a PlayStation-exclusive title took the top three, but the Switch is present with three more games (#4, #6, #9). Let’s get back to the PlayStation 5: we recently wrote about it because it got its first big firmware update.

VGC reports that the new system software has a feature that is not mentioned in its patch notes. If you have a PlayStation 5 Standard Edition (we have to mention this!), you might have noticed that it might spin the Blu-ray discs quite loud (and since a PS5 Digital Edition omits the drive, you now know why), but since the new firmware, it might be less of an issue.

On Reddit, a user said the issue is no longer present, while on ResetEra, a comment said it’s partially fixed (two loud spins and it’s gone), although during installation, we can still hear how the PlayStation 5 „eats the data from the disc.” At least the situation is improving.

Source: WCCFTech, PSL