Rentrak, the media measurement service monitoring North American home entertainment rental markets, has just released its list of the top ten video game rentals for 2008.
Microsoft's Xbox 360 dominated the list, holding 7 of the top ten spots. The remaining three spots went to Nintendo Wii titles, leaving the Playstation 3 entirely empty-handed. Hit the cut for a text version of the top ten.
1. Grand Theft Auto IV – Rockstar Games (Xbox 360)
2. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare – Activision (Xbox 360)
3. Halo 3 – Microsoft (Xbox 360)
4. Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas 2 – Ubisoft (Xbox 360)
5. Army of Two – Electronic Arts (Xbox 360)
6. Mario Kart Wii – Nintendo (Wii)
7. Super Smash Bros. Brawl – Nintendo (Wii)
8. Fallout 3 – Bethesda Softworks (Xbox 360)
9. Assassin's Creed – Ubisoft (Xbox 360)
10. Mario Party 8 – Nintendo (Wii)
As noted by GameDaily.com, an interesting trend is the prevalence of Mature titles in the 2008 list versus that of 2007 (7 of 10 versus 4 of 10 respectively). Could this spell the demise of family-friendly shovelware? Unlikely, but isn't it pretty to think so?
January 16th, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Not surprisingly most of the top 5 rentals are also games that have sold the best. Coincidence? I think not. (That sounded funnier in my head)
January 16th, 2009 at 5:39 pm
@Scott Does it strike you as interesting at all that some of the games came out in 07?