Japan's console game market is shrinking fast - report

According to a new report from the Japanese Computer Entertainment Supplier's Association, Japan's console game market shrunk by a fair margin during 2013, while the country's mobile games market expanded. As reported by industry analyst Serkan Toto, the CESA Games White Paper notes that the console game market in Japan totalled $4 billion in 2013, down from $4.8 billion in 2012. Both console hardware and software sales figures dropped by nearly half a billion dollars each. Overall the console games market in Japan dropped by around 16 percent during 2013. Notably, the CESA says that 46.7 percent of total console sales during 2013 were Nintendo 3DS hardware and software, while the PlayStation 3 made up 21.8 percent of total sales. And the CESA says that the mobile game market in Japan reached around $5.1 billion in sales during 2013, making it larger than the console game space for the first time.