February US PC charts feel Wrath of the Lich King

NPD reports World of Warcraft expansion's reign at retail has extended for another moon; Sims 2 Double Deluxe takes silver, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II bangs out bronze.

The NPD Group doesn't release monthly PC game sales figures like it does for non-PC hardware, software, and accessories. But while the latter stats won't arrive until next Thursday, this week saw the US's top game-industry research firm release its list of the top 20 PC game software titles for February.

It's good to be the (Lich) King.

To the surprise of few, World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King was the month's most popular title. The second expansion to Blizzard Entertainment's nearly 12-million-user-strong massively multiplayer online role-playing game had lorded over the PC charts until the middle of February, when it was toppled by the month's third-place finisher, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II. However, THQ and Relic's critically praised real-time strategy sequel was still bested by chart perennial The Sims 2 Double Deluxe from Electronic Arts.

Besides the top slot, the WOW series owned fourth (World of Warcraft: Battle Chest), seventh (World of Warcraft), and 10th place (World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade) on the chart. In fifth was F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin from Lord of the Rings IP reclaimer Warner Bros., followed by Will Wright's evo-civi-space sim, Spore. EA also landed eighth place with the Sims 2 Apartment Life add-on, followed in ninth by Fallout 3, GameSpot's 2008 PC Game of the Year.

A full listing of the top 20 games of February is below. Rankings are drawn up from the NPD Group's survey of retailers and do not reflect online sales or digitally distributed content on services such as Valve Software's Steam.

Feb. Rank / Jan. Rank / Title / Publisher / Average Price
1 / 1 / World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King / Blizzard / $38
2 / 2 / The Sims 2 Double Deluxe / Electronic Arts / $19
3 / */ Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II / THQ / $49
4 / 3 / World of Warcraft: Battle Chest / Blizzard / $37
5 / * / F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin / Warner Bros. Interactive / $50
6 / 4 / Spore / Electronic Arts / $45
7 / 5 / World of Warcraft / Blizzard / $18
8 / 7 / The Sims 2 Apartment Life / Electronic Arts / $20
9 / 8 / Fallout 3 / Bethesda SoftWorks / $47
10 / 11 / World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade / Blizzard / $28
11 / 10 / Call of Duty: World At War / Activision (Activision Blizzard) / $46
12 / 9 / Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 / Electronic Arts / $30
13 / 6 / Left 4 Dead / Electronic Arts / $46
14 / * / The Sims 2 Deluxe / Electronic Arts / $18
15 / 12 / Civilization IV / 2K Games ( Take 2) / $21
16 / 13 / The Sims 2 Mansion & Garden Stuff / Electronic Arts / $18
17 / 17 / Starcraft: Battle Chest / Blizzard / $20
18 / 14 / Spore Creepy & Cute Parts Pack / Electronic Arts / $18
19 / */ Diablo Battle Chest / Blizzard / $34
20 / 16 / The Sims 2 Pets / Electronic Arts / $19

95 Comments

  • Eldramesha

    Posted Mar 17, 2009 2:48 pm PT

    @J_Phett: WoW proves one thing, Art Design is still king.

  • Slammer612

    Posted Mar 17, 2009 2:06 pm PT

    @onething77

    Which is fine if your sick of it then you should say I should move on. Why would other people move on if your sick of it, perhaps if you made sense like that on the 1st post it wouldnt of been a problem, so again like I said, almost 12 million people arent "sick of it" and that your comment is pretty dumb trying to tell people to leave the game cause you dont like it.

  • J_Phett

    Posted Mar 17, 2009 12:38 am PT

    Inconnux, I completely agree. Having struggled in my early pc gaming life to get pretty much any game running on my old computer I *shudders* had to turn to Runescape to play a pc game. So people with middle-lower end computers will turn to WoW, rather than other mmorpgs with cutting-edge graphics; not just because they can run it, but so they can participate in a good game as well.

    So credit to Blizzard for realizing this and making a game/s that the vast majority of people can play...even if they bleed you dry.

  • -Unreal-

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 7:32 pm PT

    Yeah this is games sold at retail I think. So this is not including the option to buy the game ("digitaly") on Blizzard's website and download it.

  • Vaqaas0

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 2:34 pm PT

    I'm really surprised, I would've never guessed Diablo would be on the list

  • Inconnux

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 1:18 pm PT

    Blizzard does so well because they know what makes a great game... and it is not bleeding edge graphics.

    To make a great game it must run on the VAST MAJORITY of systems, it must be relatively bug free at release time, it must be FUN!

    Too many game developers think that making something overly complicated and must have bleeding edge graphics == good game. Blizzard knows better and that is why WoW, Starcraft and Diablo are still on the charts.

  • sykonfc

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 12:09 pm PT

    For Dawn of War 2 to achieve third place while only being out for half of that month, that's good. Besides, it did topple the top two in the weeks it was out.

  • jsmoke03

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 11:44 am PT

    might as well put a blizzard title on the top of that list for at least 5 more years.when sc2 and diablo 3 come out, blizzard would have cornered the pc market by a large margin

  • Humorguy_basic

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 10:52 am PT

    mattdv and everybody: NPD does not just include retail. It's right that it doesn't use Steam and other download services, mostly because those companies are not willing to release their sales numbers (probably because they are lower than people think, because if they were higher, I am sure they would release them!). If companies like Steam won't release sales numbers, you can't blame NPD - blame Steam and worry why Steam won't give out the numbers!

    What NPD DOES include is the bulk of web based retailers, like Amazon and and others that will ship the product to you. Hence, when combining retailer sales with web retailer and mail order sales, it is getting at least 70% of all sales. Becuase we don't know the sales of sites like Steam, for all we know NPD may be getting 90% of the sales or 50%. it just depends on how well companies like Steam ACTUALLY do, as opposed to what we (and the media!) ASSUME they do. When it comes to downloading, there is a lot of supposition made out as fact. You have seen/will see how 'huge' Steam and others are, but until they give out hard numbers nobody knows - remember that next time you're tempted to say downloading is huge, or Steam are huge, or if you included downloaded games the market would be much bigger - because quite frankly -we don't know. And I would suggest we pressurise the likes of Steam rather than NPD! We might also ask ourselves why we get so few sales number's in general, like this one. Because chart position is only half the story! For example, what if the No.2 title, The Sims 2 Double Deluxe sold two million and the No.3 title, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II sold 60,000. That would be telling a bigger story than just who is No.2 and No.3, wouldn't it??!! So think more about what you're NOT told, rather than what you are!

  • dewwy

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 10:24 am PT

    Holy f&%k! I had no idea the battle chests still sold that well! Who's just picking up Warcraft 3 now?

    And yea, it's pretty crazy that Activision Blizzard & EA comprise 80% of the top 20 PC games.

  • mada362005

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 9:43 am PT

    lol i love how blizzard controls 1/3 of the top 20 games and only one of them is new-ish...sad

  • _Piranha_

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 2:29 am PT

    CoD: World At War.. nice game!.. (Stalingrad and Germany/Berlin episodes)...

  • prohogo2

    Posted Mar 16, 2009 2:24 am PT

    love Dawn of War 2! Its the best rts game, period.

  • Brendissimo35

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 10:47 pm PT

    whatever, steam still beats this

  • gameking5000

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 10:19 pm PT

    Seriously why is Sims on the list? I thought it was old.

  • mattdv

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 10:05 pm PT

    This is just for games sold at retail, right? I don't remember the last time I bought a PC game at a real store...

  • Humorguy_basic

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 9:54 pm PT

    Oh, and adziboy, if you like deep strategy games, get DoW and the expansions. If you like heavy on the action with very very light roleplaying, then get DoW 2. Either way, you'll be spending about the same amount of money. But DoW and it's expansions will keep you entertained for about 10 times longer.

    I'll back this up by pointing out that at the same point after release, DoW had sold 40% more units than DoW 2. (Something to chew on!)

  • Humorguy_basic

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 9:49 pm PT

    I say this every month - whre are the SALES numbers. Because I think you'll find there is a HUGE drop off between No.1 and 2 and No.3 - No.20!!

    Also, when you take out the main course of Sims packages, then the Spore deserts, you don't have much of a hard-core meal to keep you sustained either!

    All sad news for those of us in PC gaming for more than 10 years....!

  • Michall

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 9:32 pm PT

    Adziboy, DoW2 is definitely worth the money. The single player is very different from the 1st part, you only control 4 squads at a time and get skills and items. When I heard about it, I felt disappointed but when I started playing the game really drew me in quickly and I really enjoy it. The experience and item gathering draws you in, and the action is great. You get to make a lot of choices and as your guys grow in strength, you really feel it as they annihilate everything much faster than with worse gear.

    Get it, it's not even that expensive.

  • Ownsin

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 7:13 pm PT

    Its at the top because there isn't any good game selling...

  • VenomRitual

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 6:18 pm PT

    GS please stop posting these stats until the NPD starts taking into account digital downloads.

  • msudude211

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 5:22 pm PT

    WoW is still number one on the list?

  • aura_enchanted

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 12:54 pm PT

    adziboy its worth the money if u liked the first of them but u will find thegame alot more microcosmmic than the previous ones (microcosmic: smaller scale)

  • simkenys

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 12:00 pm PT

    demi_veritaz

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 7:29 am CET

    WoW got boring within a few months. Waste of 80 bucks.
    Got to 70 in a month then PvPed for a while, farmed a while, played dk and did extra sh*t for a a couple of months. It's all solid, but repetitive. Maybe I didn't spend enough time with it overall, but I couldn't see myself getting much more out of it by renewing my subscription. Sure, I could get better gear/skill for my level 70s, but what would be the pointless because I'd just be doing the same thing with the new gear/ability.
    Waste of time, in my opinion.

    You could level up to 80 ... lol

  • arronizmiguel

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 10:57 am PT

    Diablo 2 is my #1 game since 6 years ago, followed by Civilization IV... I can tell I'm not the only one

  • Adziboy posted Mar 15, 2009 9:47 am PT (does not meet display criteria. sign in to show)

    Adziboy

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 9:47 am PT (hide)

    Is the new DOW any good? Thinking about picking it up, but I haven't gamed on my PC for a long time. PS3 took over gaming.

  • ferid84 posted Mar 15, 2009 7:46 am PT (does not meet display criteria. sign in to show)

    ferid84

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 7:46 am PT (hide)

    who is still buying starcraft or diablo?
    the list if fishy, not that i have anything against those games.
    also i wish blizzard pays more attention to consoles...i want to see games developed by them on my x360

  • xXFr34k_0uTXx

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 4:50 am PT

    Blizzard really is a great company. I give none of their games lower than a B+. Good to see them making money so they can improve SC2 and D3, which not to mention will demolish future pc charts. O.o

    Plus, after hearing all the different opinions, praises, and skepticism about D3, Blizzard will surely soak them in and make gratifying changes to make the gameplay and atmosphere of D3 long lasting and enjoying. Hell, you could technically say that about any of their games, considering SC and D2 are still reeling in $$.

    A year after the release of SC2 and D3, Blizzard will have enough money between all three franchises to create one hell of a new MMO, which will be announced this summer. Congrats to the 5.star General of CPU gaming

    Also excited for Bethesda! Bring in my next favorite Role Playing Game please!! =D

    D3

  • Ryuketsu2043

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 3:56 am PT

    SWG was the best mmo out there pre-expasnion that is. I have yet to come across abetter community or bigger world to explore and have fun. *sigh* good times

  • soupa_mario

    Posted Mar 15, 2009 12:46 am PT

    Nearly everything on this list is EA or Blizzard

  • Jaster_DCX

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 11:41 pm PT

    i can't believe that starcraft and diablo still sell..

  • demi_veritaz

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 11:29 pm PT

    WoW got boring within a few months. Waste of 80 bucks.
    Got to 70 in a month then PvPed for a while, farmed a while, played dk and did extra sh*t for a a couple of months. It's all solid, but repetitive. Maybe I didn't spend enough time with it overall, but I couldn't see myself getting much more out of it by renewing my subscription. Sure, I could get better gear/skill for my level 70s, but what would be the pointless because I'd just be doing the same thing with the new gear/ability.
    Waste of time, in my opinion.

  • BloodMist

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 11:25 pm PT

    Mmm..SWG has so much more...you could build your own city, be alliance, rebel, or Imperial(us rebels called em Imps for short), be a farmer, a bounty hunter, a soldier, in both factions...Bounty Hunter, Entertainer, hell crafting could take all your time in SWG if you wanted it to be.....SWG was...amazing.The first time i was runnin through the desert and seeing a probe droid say to me, "What's your status"? I knew, that was indeed, a universe.

  • gameking5000

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 10:47 pm PT

    @BloodMist

    Star Wars galaxies was in-depth and WoW is no different. There are 4 massive blocks of land that take FOREVER to go from one corner to the other. So many quests, such good graphics that don't demand much from your computer. The end-game features is one of the best as well. There's so much in it that it's very hard to not to find something to do.

  • Kenji_Masamune

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 9:51 pm PT

    if wow sucked in any way shape for form, then you'd see a surge of people join up.. and within a few months drop off the charts. Good sign to let you know how good the game is by how fast the people run away from the game.

  • BloodMist

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 9:17 pm PT

    Well that's like, for example, so-so PvP...you obviously suck at it...Wrath added nothing to the game, except the excellent Death Knight class and awesome quests that move the story along in a great way...ect., ect. ect.So, glad you like Fallout 3 and Oblivion, but you haven't adapted to WoW and haven't seen all the excellence that it can offer you.

    Now...unfortunately the best, most in-depth MMO was Star Wars Galaxies...there's no MMO that could compare to how in-depth it was..used to be...sadly that is no more.

  • Ovirew

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 9:10 pm PT

    Well, Bloodmist, if you were to look at my gamertag right now, then you would see that the last two games I played (just a few minutes ago, I might add) are indeed Fallout 3 and Oblivion. I love both of those games, I think WOW is just so-so. I didn't hate WOW, I didn't say I hate it, and I think I was pretty darn respectful to it. I am meerly stating, the game does not deserve this tremendous amount of overhype that it is getting, and I would like to see better MMOs get made because I am not really impressed by what I see.

  • BloodMist

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 9:07 pm PT

    Well, haha, you remind me of the people who try to knock games like Fallout 3 or Oblivion...not taking advantage of all that the game can offer you, quite jaded, and also full of crap.So there ya go.

  • Ovirew

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 9:03 pm PT

    Why does WOW deserve overhype? You tell me that. You just click on little buttons to perform attacks, which you buy (?) from 'trainers', and you are more than welcome to study professions but they are more for profit than for creation of equipment and supplies - the loot you get from monsters after a while is rediculously strong. PVP leaves a lot to be desired, the graphics are good but it's starting to show that this is almost half a decade old and we could use something with more modern graphics and character models. Going to a bunch of guys over and over again to get new quests to drive the game along is a primitive concept, and is the most repetitive game feature ever created - they can do something a lot better than this if they try. It might be the best MMO we have now, but I do not think World of Warcraft deserves praise for expected behavior.

    Also, I feel that Wrath of the Lich King added very little to the game in terms of content - it's really just extra stuff for high-level players to mess around with after they get bored with the main game and outland. 'Epic Mount'??? Hero class??? That definately screams, "Keep playing, don't stop feeding us your money just yet!"

  • BloodMist

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 9:01 pm PT

    Starcraft is still the best RTS ever made..no doubt about it.Doesn't surprise me.

  • The_Gobfather

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 8:57 pm PT

    I was surprised Starcraft is on this list... how long ago did that come out, and its still in the top 20? That's gotta tell you something about how good a game is.

  • BloodMist

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 8:53 pm PT

    So, why exactly does it not deserve it?Got any real observations on the subject?

  • Ovirew

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 8:52 pm PT

    I don't get it. WOW isn't a horrible game, but I never fully understood just why it is as popular as it is. Just last week or whatever they broke records with over 10 million players, and already that has gone up 20% to 12 million players? It is just rediculous. If this keeps up, we may never see another good MMO come out and improve upon the genre, and right now WOW knows no peer in the online gaming industry. Someone's gotta step it up and make a better MMO, because I don't think it deserves this much overhype.

  • BlueBirdTS

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 8:52 pm PT

    Okay, perhaps I exaggerated when saying"don't mean squat." I should have phrased my words "do not fully reflect PC sales, especially in the context of a global industry."

  • JofuInSpace

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 8:41 pm PT

    Activision Blizzard and EA exchanging punches. Also, do The Sims games still sell that much? I'm some what surprised by that.

  • YukoAsho

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 8:24 pm PT

    The thing I find most amazing is that there are so few NEW titles. Games seem to linger on the PC charts for years at a time. Seriously, the Diablo Battle Chest? Doesn't EVERYONE have that by now?

  • BloodMist

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 6:24 pm PT

    Oh sure DMC if by worse you mean far less annoying to play.BTW if you're gonna say Blizzard steals all their races from Games Workshop, give credit where credit is due:Games Workshop doesn't have an original bone in their body either, at least as far as Warhammer is concerned.

  • saturo123

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 6:15 pm PT

    sure is good to be blizzard... jeez

  • daabulls23

    Posted Mar 14, 2009 5:57 pm PT

    Quite a variety, although I still cringe that The Sims just pops up every three or four spots.

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