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PS4 Tops January 2016 US Console Sales Charts

Sony's console is yet again the top seller in the United States.

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The PlayStation 4 started off 2016 on a strong note, selling more consoles than any other system in the US during January 2016, Sony announced today. Citing a report from NPD Group, Sony said the PS4 was also the software sales leader for the month.

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"PS4 also saw impressive year-over-year growth in both hardware and software sales," a Sony representative said in a statement to GameSpot. "We appreciate the support and will continue to deliver on our promise to bring the best entertainment experiences to gamers."

Sony did not share any specific numbers for console or game sales in its statement today. As of the start of January, the PS4 had sold close to 36 million consoles worldwide.

According to NPD, total industry hardware sales (console and portable) dropped 15 percent to $157 million. In a statement, NPD analyst Liam Callahan said the downturn in sales was partially attributable to price cuts that were implemented during the year for "eight-generation" systems including PS4 and Xbox One.

“Recently, hardware declines typically were a result of seventh generation console and portable declines exceeding growth in eighth-generation hardware sales," he explained. "In January 2016, however, the sales of eighth-generation consoles declined by 8 percent, despite relatively flat unit sales, as average prices dipped by 6 percent as a result of price cuts that took place between January 2015 and January 2016. This eighth-generation decline in conjunction with the 81 percent decline of seventh-generation hardware, and the 21 percent decline in portable hardware sales led to the overall 15 percent decline in January 2016 hardware sales."

Callahan also noted that sales of eight-generation systems made up 96 percent of all console hardware sales during the month, an increase from 84 percent for January 2015.

Microsoft released its own statement, too. Xbox marketing executive Mike Nichols said the year is off to a "great start" for Xbox, with the total number of hours spent gaming in one month on Xbox One worldwide passing 1 billion hours in January.

"We can't thank our fans enough for their continued support and passion for Xbox," he said.

Nintendo also released a statement today, but it only included details about Amiibo and software performance, not hardware.

"Coming off a strong holiday season, sales of Nintendo's Amiibo figures continued on a solid pace in January, with more than half a million figures sold in the United States, according to the NPD Group, which tracks U.S. video game sales," Nintendo said. "Sales of Amiibo jumped 36 percent compared to January 2015. That was enough to push the total number of Amiibo sold in the U.S. to more than 12 million since they launched in November 2014.

"In other NPD news, Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS sold more than 36,000 last month, bringing its lifetime U.S. sales to more than 3 million. That's in addition to U.S. sales of more than 2.3 million for Super Smash Bros. for Wii U."

As for game sales, Call of Duty: Black Ops III led the way in January 2016. You can see the full Top 10 sales chart here.

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