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While physical retail software sales appear to have trailed off at this stage in the  Xbox 360’s life cycle, XBLA has reportedly experienced its strongest year yet in 2012. According to the Research and Analysis division of Forecasting & Analyzing Digital Entertainment, LLC (FADE), the XBLA marketplace saw revenues of $290 million, doubling its reported revenue from the previous year.

Three games in particular were clearly behind this strong performance. It’s perhaps no surprise that Minecraft leads the pack, agonizingly close to the 5 million sales mark with 4,997,000 unit sales, translating to a gross revenue of $97,388,000.

In second place, Trials Evolution shifted 1,002,000 units for a gross revenue of $14,298,000. Similarly, the XBLA version of Telltale’s The Walking Dead generated $10,277,000 in gross revenue from 2,615,000 unit sales.

The remaining seven games in FADE’s top 10 don’t quite reach the lofty heights of the aforementioned, all of them posting between 300,000 and 200,000 unit sales. It’s interesting to note, however, older games like 2008’s Castle Crashers and 2009’s Trials HD continue to enjoy relatively strong sales.

FADE’s top 10 XBLA titles in 2012 are as follows, ordered by gross revenues:

  1. Minecraft (4J Studios) – 4,997,000 units/$97,388,000
  2. Trials Evolution (RedLynx, LTD) – 1,002,000 units/$14,298,000
  3. The Walking Dead (Telltale Games) – 2,615,000 units/$10,277,000
  4. Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (Valve) – 273,000/$3,973,000
  5. Castle Crashers (The Behemoth) – 252,000 units/$3,778,000
  6. Gotham City Impostors (Monolith Productions) – 258,000 units/$3,698,000
  7. I Am Alive (Ubisoft) – 245,000 units/$3,609,000
  8. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD (Robomodo) – 226,000 units/$3,261,000
  9. Alan Wake’s American Nightmare (Remedy Entertainment) – 206,000 units/$2,903,000
  10. Trials HD (RedLynx, LTD) – 203,000/$2,799,000