Despite being one of the most inhospitable game markets in Europe, ban-friendly Germany has somehow taken over the United Kingdom to become Europe’s biggest. Yep, the country that invented the term “killer games” and bans everything it can get away is now on top of the PAL mountain.
Germany has slipped into first place thanks to a 20% decline in year-on-year software sales in the UK for the first half of 2009. It’s Britain’s decline and not Germany’s growth that has led to the change in places. Germany itself has boasted no real change to its market.
Even though this is thanks to the UK’s sales drop, it’s still weird to here that a nation with such a backwards view of videogames could be such an influential market. It’s quite sad too, because this simply hammers home the fact that publishers need to pander to Germany’s childish demands for edited content. I wish the industry could freeze Germany out until it decided to grow up.