Assassin’s Creed Valhalla takes Christmas number 1 as Cyberpunk 2077 falls to third place | UK Box Charts

It was a close race for Christmas No. 1 this year, with Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed Valhalla emerging as the No. 1 physical game of the time.

It’s the first time Assassin’s Creed has claimed the number one position for Christmas (and indeed the first time for Ubisoft), and only the third time that a non-FIFA or Call of Duty game has topped the charts. of hits in 15 years (source: GfK Entertainment).

The game soared in sales 66% due to some price discounts before Christmas. The game beat out Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, which came in second after managing to sell as many copies last week as it did the week before. It’s the first time that the Black Ops subseries failed to claim Christmas # 1.

Last week’s big No. 1 was Cyberpunk 2077, and the RPG dropped 80% in sales this week and falls to No. 3. The game has received extremely negative press in recent days due to its poor technical performance in PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. However, it is worth noting that an 80% drop in sales is not very unusual for a game like this. In fact, other games that secured big pre-orders, like The Last of Us: Part Two in the summer and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla in November, fell 80% and 70% respectively in their second week.

The negative press likely had some impact on sales of the game this week, but most of the drop is to be expected.

CD Projekt’s new game keeps FIFA 21 at bay, which has to settle for fourth place despite a 40% increase in sales. Meanwhile, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is at No. 5 with an 11% drop in sales, the first drop in sales it has experienced in more than a month. Only 9,000 units separate Animal Crossing at No. 5 and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla at No. 1.

This entire chart is purely based on physical retail sales.

Elsewhere, there were a series of last-minute spikes in sales across all lists, in part due to discounting prices. Spider-Man: Miles Morales rises to No. 6 after 45% sales increase, Ring Fit Adventure returns to Top Ten at No. 9 after 155% sales jump, and Super Mario 3D All-Stars ranked 10th place with a 44% increase in sales. Outside of the Top Ten, Immortals: Fenyx Rising jumps to No. 12 thanks to a 107% sales increase, Watch Dogs Legion is No. 14 due to a 98% sales increase, and Carnival Games returns to No. 35 with a 499.% increase in sales. There were also deals on PS4 games, which meant The Last of Us: Part Two returns to number 30 with a sales increase of 374 |%, and Ghost of Tsushima reaches number 34 after sales surged 208%. .

Here’s GfK’s Christmas Top Ten for the week ending December 19:

And just for fun, here are all the other Christmas number 1s ever. FIFA (eight) and Call of Duty (eight) are the franchises that have the highest combined number of Christmas No.1s.