With overall sales figures in the UK down for January 2011 it has not been a good start to the year.

January is always a difficult month in retail. As people become more careful with the purse strings following Christmas and a lot of people facing a five or six week pay period figures usually drop. In addition to this the VAT rise in the UK has led to some low figures for the video game industry during January 2011 when compared to the same period in 2010.

MCV has analysed the figures from January 2011 and while the industry as a whole is down and many companies have struggled Nintendo have little to celebrate. Their software market share compared to other companies, in terms of both units and value, has declined so that they are now ranked third behind Electronic Arts and Ubisoft.

Similarly the software market share by format in terms of both units and value sees the Nintendo Wii and DS at third and fourth place respectively. The Xbox 360 came out top for January with the PS3 just behind.

Nintendo's highest selling title for January was Wii Fit Plus, which was the seventh highest selling title for the month. Many other sports and fitness titles feature in the top fifty selling titles of January, indicating it was more than just the financial pounds that gamers were worried about. Just Dance 2 continued it's success in January and was third overall, making it the highest selling title for a Nintendo console.

Whether February will be any better for Nintendo remains to be seen but with the 3DS and Pokémon Black & White out next month hopefully at least March will see some success.