Excel is fun! No, I’m serious. It really is as long as you fill it with something you care about like your favorite team’s stats, how often black comes up, or, I don’t know, stamp statistics. Fill it with video game stats, and you can get a picture of the video game industry as a whole. I did it the past two years already thanks to my insane hobby of writing about game releases weekly, and this time my methods have become far more sophisticated. By that I mean I used Excel instead of an abacus.

By Consoles

Once again, the sheer number of games that came out this year versus last slid once again from 801 last year to 750 this year. The cause of this downward trend can be attributed to the Nintendo Wii’s downward trend in terms of releases. If it wasn’t for the HD console’s rise in output, the overall total would have been much lower.

The biggest loser, in terms of number of games coming out, this year looks to be the Nintendo consoles with both the Wii releases and the DS releases cooling off. The reduction in the DS releases can be attributed to the newly released 3DS this year with publishers switching gears between the two handhelds. As for the Wii, publishers have been losing interest in the console since 2009 and 2010, and this year we can clearly see that lack of interest manifesting in the number of retail games being published for that platform. That number will surely dip even more in 2012 since Nintendo has announced the Wii’s successor in the Wii U.

The Wii’s lost appears to be the HD console’s gain. Both the Xbox 360 and the PS3 has seen a rise in releases this year once again. Like before, gamers’s rising confidence in the li’l 10 year console have translated into publisher confidence in releasing games for the platform. As for the Xbox 360, their numbers have risen namely because of the Kinect.

Since the Kinect’s release, the Xbox 360 has become the new home for a number of genres that used to be prevalent on the Wii. The Mini-game collection has some kind of an affinity towards to the latest motion controller like the Kinect. We’ve seen at least 15 of them on the console in this year alone. All of which utilizes the Kinect. If that wasn’t enough, Just Dance started a new craze in the music genre that has spread towards the Kinect. The PS3 has the Move, but has not seen a similar rise in these two genres. What little games that do show up here utilizing the Move tend to be ports from the Xbox 360 version.

Unsurprisingly, the PSP releases have dropped down to 26 compared to the 60 in 2010. What surprised me is that 16 of which are PSP exclusive. Despite the horrible reputation the PSP has here, publishers still has enough confidence in the PSP to release a good number of games for it here in the U.S., but all but one of these games were developed by a Japanese developer. Invizimals was developed by a European developer, Novarama, while the rest like Lord of Arcana and Gods Eater Burst were developed by Square Enix and Namco Bandai. Don’t expect this trend to change anytime soon with the upcoming release of the PSVita this February.

By Genre

Let’s shift focus to genres. Like last year, the Mini-Game Collection craze not only continued but gained even more momentum in 2011 thanks to the introduction of the Kinect and the Move. The two peripherals gave publishers a reason to port over to the HD consoles what would otherwise have been a Wii and/or DS exclusive. Despite that though, the Wii and the DS wins again in this category.

So, you’re a First Person Shooter freak and want nothing but FPS games to play? Which system do you choose, the PS3 or the Xbox 360? Sheer number-wise, you’d pick the PS3, which edges out the Xbox 360 by exactly one more FPS over the Xbox 360. The PS3 has both the Killzone franchise and the Resistance franchise exclusively whereas the Xbox 360 only has the Halo franchise. Every other FPS either shows up on both or not at all i.e. the Conduit series on the Wii. And here we thought the Xbox 360 was the go to destination for FPSs.

What about the Role Playing Game genre? The PS3 once again wins with 12 games available for it. All the big RPGs like Dragon Age 2 and Skyrim have a PS3 version in addition to a Xbox 360 version, but most Japanese RPGs on the PS3 doesn’t get ported over to the 360.

After the music genre crash of 2009/2010, one would think the music genre would fizzle out to the occasional DanceDanceRevolutions half hearted attempt at a comeback every now and then, but compared to last year, the genre is rising once again. Thanks to both the success of the Just Dance franchise and the existence of Kinect, dancing games has revived the once dying music genre back to 2009 levels. Just Dance alone saw three releases in 2011, one numbered sequel and two offshoots. Guitar Hero did something very similar during its heyday, which makes one wonder about the dance game’s future trajectory.

Parting Shots

That’s the best I can come up with for now, but if I really stop and play around with filters and whatnot, I bet I could come up with weird patterns and coincidences. Unfortunately, I don’t have that kind of time. Tell you what. I’ll make the spreadsheet available to anyone who wants it. Just shoot me an e-mail at kwinata@rrbgames.com with subject “2011 Spreadsheet,” and I’ll send you a copy of all the data I have. Then you’ll know that I’m not making any of this stuff up. I’ll be watching the comments to see what you guys can come up with.

This feature is originally posted on rrbgames.com