Elden Ring tops the list of best-selling video games in Europe during first half of 2022

So far, 2022 has been quite the year for the gaming industry, and we can only imagine what the rest of the year has in store for gamers all around the world. In the meantime, we do have statistics about the most-happening game titles for the first half of the year.

Game Industry has gone on to publish the stats for the top 20 best-selling video games for the first half of 2022 all over Europe. While some names were quite obviously expected to make it on the list, some came as a surprise. 

Also keep in mind that the list only talks about the games that sold the most copies, and not the “best games” of the first half of 2022, which means that the list has nothing to do with the actual quality of the games.

It was reported that 76.1 million games were sold across Europe during the first six months of the year 2022, with a “rise of 13.5% over the same period in 2021,” according to GSD Market Data.

What’s interesting though, is that over half of this total amount was sold as digital copies, with 44 million copies being sold through digital stores while 32 million of these games were sold as physical copies. It should be noted that the physical data covers all the games sold in a box, with digital data covering games majorly from AAA game developers, excluding Nintendo.

Germany proved to be the biggest European market for game sales with nearly 15.4 million games sold, both physically and digitally, during the first six months of the year, with a rise in sales of 13.6 percent when compared to the same period in 2021. The U.K. followed as a close second with 14.3 million digital and physical sales combined, with France in third at 10.2 million sales. The former was up two percent in sales while the latter, 12.1 percent

When considering Europe as a whole, however, Elden Ring easily snagged the title of the best-selling game for the first six months of the year 2022. Something to note, however, is that while Pokémon Legends: Arceus came in third place, its download sales were not included since Nintendo does not share its digital statistics.

Pokémon Legends: Arceus could therefore have hit a higher spot, likely taking over FIFA 22 for second place. That being said, the Switch-exclusive would be far from catching up and beating Elden Ring in sales anyways.

Even then, since Nintendo Switch games usually favor the physical retail market more than the digital sphere, Pokémon Legends: Arceus ended up being the number one game in terms of physical sales only.

Below are the exact standings for the 20 best-selling games of the first half of 2022, as reported by Game Industry.

European GSD H1 2022 Top 20 Games (Digital + Physical)

Game Industry also spoke about the hiccups in supply for console hardware throughout the first half of the year.

There has been an apparent “drop of over 21% year-on-year” for console sales across the tracked European countries, with just over 2 million machines sold, the reason which can be mainly attributed to the lack of stock availability for PS5, with PS5 sales “down nearly 44% for the first half of the year.”

It should be noted that the most popular console still remains the Nintendo Switch, with a “sales rise of 7%” over the same period of the year prior.

In a similar vein, Xbox Series S and X enjoyed a growth in sales of nine percent over the same period last year.