Monster Hunter Wilds' launch month sales doubled Monster Hunter Rise from back in 2021, but one lingering problem remains.
Monster Hunter Wilds is officially February 2025's best-selling game in the United States of America, according to the information that Circana, an industry-tracking firm, shared. The launch month dollar sales from the newest addition of the series even doubled the sales of Monster Hunter Rise from back in 2021, and were 40 percent higher than Monster Hunter World.
While half of the sales overall are from the PC version, Monster Hunter Wilds' sales still top every platform on which it was released: Xbox, PlayStation, and PC.
This month saw six newly-released games break the top 20 best-selling games in the USA. All five of them were placed in the top 10 of the list. Kingdom Come: Deliverance II came in second on the list behind Monster Hunter Wilds. The sequel of the often-praised Kingdom Come: Deliverance was also well-received by gamers, with its launch month sales in dollars amounting to five times the original from back in 2018.
The highly-awaited 4X game Civilization VII grabbed third place for the best-selling game of February 2025, while the golf simulation game PGA Tour 2K25 took fourth. Avowed and Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii placed seventh and eighth, respectively.
Monster Hunter Wilds' success still couldn't offset the declining sales of video games
While Monster Hunter Wilds achieved massive success and topped the sales leaderboard for February 2025, it was still not enough to offset the declining video game sales in that month. The total video game sales for February 2025 saw a six percent decline from the previous year during the same period, and was 11 percent lower on the year-to-date data.
Overall, sales have declined since January 2025, but one category has performed even worse: hardware sales. Mat Piscatella, Circana’s executive producer for games reports, said that February video game hardware spending fell by 25% when compared to a year ago, down to $256 million.
“February video game hardware spending fell by 25% when compared to a year ago, to $256 million. This is the lowest February total for video game hardware spending since the $184 million reached in February 2020…. After each platform’s first 52 months in market, PlayStation 5 unit sales exceed PlayStation 4’s sales pace by 7%, while Xbox Series now trails Xbox One by 19%”
During last year's sales, Circana also reported that February video game hardware spending had already fallen by 30 percent. Monster Hunter Wilds is available now on PlayStation, Xbox Series S|X, and PC.
