The economic downturn has taken its tole on the video game industry over the past two years.  Today, NPD Group reported U.S. sales of video-game hardware, software and accessories fell 8 percent to $1.22 billion in September from a year earlier.  Overall the manufacturers reported a 19 percent drop in hardware sales, 6 percent decline in software and a 13 percent gain in accessories thanks to products such as the Move controller.

The lone victor in the gaming space in September was Microsoft which launched “Halo: Reach”.  The company reported it sold 484,000 Xbox 360 consoles during the month and nearly 3.3 million copies of “Halo: Reach”.  The biggest loser was Nintendo who reported sales of 254,000 Wii consoles and 403,000 Nintendo DS handhelds, down from 462,800 Wii consoles and 524,200 DS handhelds a year earlier.

An interesting twist to the previous reports from NPD Group is they will no longer report sales of consoles by manufacturers and instead will release total hardware revenue.  According to their report total hardware revenue fell to $383 million from $472 million a year earlier.