New Zealanders continue to embrace video and computer games, as evidenced by new sales figures released today by the Interactive Games - Entertainment Association (IGEA).

Consumer spending on games and hardware reached $452.3 million in 2017, a 7% spike on the previous year's sales.

New Zealand total physical retail sales came in at $118.3 million and overall digital sales at $334 million last year.

According to data from The NPD Group, overall physical retail sales experienced a 4% decline, however, this was offset by an increase in sales volume, which was up 4% in 2017.

Home console hardware and accessories sales also increased last year.

Kiwis embraced both new and retro consoles.

PlayStation 4 continued to dominate sales in the hardware sector with Xbox One bolstering category growth with the introduction of Xbox One X.

The Nintendo Switch also entered the market, performing well alongside the Nintendo Classic Mini: SNES and Nintendo Classic Mini: NES.

Research from Telsyte shows total digital sales were strong, up 12% in 2017.

Digital downloads, including full game downloads and digital extras, increased by 20% last year.

Subscription revenue also continued to grow, up 22% year-on-year.

Mobile game sales retained the majority share of the digital games market at $175 million.

IGEA CEO Ron Curry says, “The New Zealand video and computer games industry is in great shape, evidenced by the latest sales figures that show consumer spending is headed towards half a billion dollars.

“New Zealanders are more than happy to access their games content in a variety of ways, both physically and digitally.

“Sales for the current generation of consoles, PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, remain strong, at the same time, we're seeing impressive growth in subscription revenue, mobile game sales, and downloads of digital games and extras.

Since 2009, IGEA has provided a review of the state of New Zealand's video games industry using commissioned research from The NPD Group.

With the growth of digital gaming, the NPD data has been augmented with research from Telsyte to provide a complete picture of the state of the industry.