Tag: quarterly

Funcom Q3 2018 Report: Highest Quarterly Earnings In Company History


Funcom yesterday posted its third quarter earnings for 2018, and the results are rather positive. Third quarter earnings amounted to $7.5 million, a 25% increase over last year, with earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization amounted to $4.6 million. The developer happily notes that not only has cash flow beaten the full year’s numbers for last year, which was the highest in Funcom histroy, but that the company is now free of interest-bearing debt for the first time since 2009 and holds a cash balance of $20.9 million.

On the road ahead, Funcom has six titles in its lineup including Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden, Petroglyph’s Conan game set for the second quarter 2019, Rock Pocket’s Funcom IP game set for Halloween 2019, a cooperative shooter from Funcom North Carolina, a single-player Conan game from Funcom Oslo, and an open-world multiplayer game also from Funcom Oslo. It appears that Petroglyph’s Conan game will release on PC while Rock Pocket’s title is set for PC, Xbox, and Playstation. Funcom NC’s title utilizes a premium business model while both of Funcom Oslo’s titles are in pre-production stages.

Conan Exiles continues to be a strong seller for Funcom.

(Source: Funcom)

Mobile Dominates NCSoft Quarterly Report


NCSoft’s second quarter finances have been released and they are quite a doozy. While sales grew 8% both quarterly and over last year, profit and income both dropped 56% and 66% respectively thanks to increased labor costs and marketing increases. Just how much? 370%, from 5.1 billion KRW in Q2 2016 to 24.1 billion in 2017. Similarly, labor costs jumped 24% and “variable costs” went up 186%, due in part to a 244% increase in royalty payments. Ouch.

On the game’s side of the report, mobile has dominated NCSoft’s revenue reports and has become the largest sector by a wide margin, even against Lineage which continued to drop in revenue thanks to a lack of promotion over the second quarter. Every other title in NCSoft’s library (as noted below) also dropped by some factor in revenue during this period, with the sale of mobile games making up for their shortcomings. The launch of Lineage M, the mobile Lineage port, is also to thank for a drop in Lineage revenue as some players made the jump over to mobile.

Guild Wars 2 is expected to receive a substantial bump thanks to the impending launch of its next expansion. The full report can be found over at the NCSoft website

NCSoft Releases Quarterly Earnings, Lineage M Sees Lower Demand


NCSoft’s quarterly earnings have been made available and the results are not so bad. Sales fell 1% over the same time last year thanks to early recognition of Lineage 1 promotion sales with NCSoft pointing to lower demand than expected for Lineage M, the mobile release of Lineage. Operating profit and income plummeted 60-70% year over year due to incentives paid on the back of high earnings last year, meaning NCSoft players should not see these figures as the end times.

To put it into perspective, NCSoft’s net income dropped from 66,804 (million Korean Won) to 17,394 (49,410) over the past quarter. Labor cost increases due to increased headcount and incentives rose 33% by 33,175 while royalty payments exploded 398% over last quarter by 2,261. In short, while sales fell 1% over last year, operating costs increased 24% due to said overhead costs.

On the games front, Lineage sales plummeted by more than half, however much of that is due to the aforementioned early sales recognition is unknown. Lineage II and Aion similarly dipped in revenue, although not by nearly as large of a margin, while Blade & Soul grew compared to the last two quarters and Guild Wars 2 remained relatively stable. Wildstar, as mentioned in the previous release, is no longer listed on NCSoft’s quarterly reports.

Funcom Q3 2016: Bad For Funcom, Good For The Secret World


jomali

It doesn’t take a financial expert to know that things aren’t so hot when the top story is the sale of 15 million shares for $954 thousand. Funcom has released their third quarter revenues and the results are not so great. Revenue in Q3 amounted to $1.7 million, down from the nearly $2.2 million over the same period last year and compounded by the presence of said share sale. The good news is that the company no longer appears to be fully underwater, with equity at $97 thousand compared to negative $365 thousand over the same period last year.

As announced well over a year ago now, Funcom has changed its development strategy to one that focuses on small, low budget experimental titles alongside less frequent, larger games. This new plan has brought us The Park, spooky jump-scare game Hide & Shriek, as well as the upcoming Conan Legends, slated for release into early access in January. According to the quarterly report, Funcom are constantly looking out for new and emerging platforms like virtual reality and eSports, and augmented reality to create new products.

The Secret World players will be happy to know that a massive update is coming in the first half of 2017, something that Funcom has described as a “major upgrade to both retention and acquisition mechanics and content of the game.” Age of Conan will be receiving a new dungeon while Anarchy Online hopes to revitalize itself by launching on Steam sometime in the fourth quarter. The Park is effectively a money machine at this point, as low as its sales are, due to the fact that development has finished.

As for Conan Exiles, expect more marketing on that game to crop up in November with the additional news that the game is being developed for Xbox One, while Funcom hopes that the game will still be in the top 10 survival games being played a year after launch. Another Conan game is in the works, albeit very early in the concept phase, and not set to go into development until Conan Exiles exits early access.

(Source: Funcom)

Nexon Boasts 11% Boost In Sales


Riders of Icarus

Nexon has posted its latest financial statement for the first quarter 2016 and the results are indeed something to write home about. First quarter revenue amounted to 57.5 billion yen ($530 million USD), an 11% increase over the same period last year. Sales were driven partially due to the higher-than-anticipated sales of Dungeon&Fighter in China.

Alternately, operating income underperformed primarily due to the impairment loss on Gloops’ goodwill of 22.6 billion yen. Nexon bought Gloops for $486 million cash back in 2012. Impairment loss refers to the cost of acquisition minus the depreciation.

Nexon’s earnings call will take place later this morning.

(Source: Nexon press release)

[Column] NCSoft, Misconceptions And Frequently Asked


WildStar64 2014-05-08 13-12-45-60

The kind of activity I’m seeing among the Wildstar community is pretty similar to those of other MMOs when they were either in the process of being shut down, or at heavily speculated risk of being shut down. So none of what I’m about to discuss is of any surprise to me, and I don’t want people thinking that I’m just singling out the Wildstar community for behaving in such a manner. Thank you.

First of all, you can read my analysis of NCSoft’s first quarter report at MMORPG.com. I’m no trained expert in finance, but I’ve been doing these quarterly reports for five years, and in the months that I’m not regurgitating income and revenues, I’m doing research and chatting with real investment bankers. So I have at least a good grasp on what I’m talking about and the charts the present are all mine, so you know I’ve actually read them.

The unfortunate side effect of this being a somewhat complicated topic is that articles like this usually end up with a lot of gotcha questions from fans and “haters” alike, statements you know are wrong but can’t really refute with the proper level of confidence.

I decided to compile a few of the most common things I see concerning quarterly reports, particularly for this one.

  • The graph shows box sales, not total revenue.

Incorrect. The figure reported by NCSoft is total revenue per game, from box sales to subscriptions and cash shop purchases. No, this isn’t directly stated on the quarterly report sheet, but it is discussed in more detail over the conference call. Also, just consider this from a logical point of view. There are games on this list that don’t exist in a boxed form anymore, in any region. Sales for titles like Aion and Lineage II would be zilch if the figure only counted box sales.

  • But my guild is growing, the game must be growing too!

A nice sentiment, but anecdotal and ultimately meaningless, not to mention demonstrably false given we know for a fact that Wildstar’s sales are dropping. Also consider how small the game’s population would need to be in order for one guild’s numbers to be indicative of the overall population.

  • Who cares what the revenue is as long as the game is profitable?

You should, at least fans of the game should. While some developers might be happy with just profitable, it doesn’t take an expert to know that NCSoft is not that kind of developer. If NCSoft was happy with a game being somewhat profitable, we’d still be playing City of Heroes.

  • Your sources are unaudited and therefore inaccurate.

Half true. The figures provided are not audited, meaning they are in their form as NCSoft has submitted them. While it is possible that a mistake was made and the numbers are wrong, you would need some hard evidence to prove why the numbers should be doubted.

 

EA Filing Blames The Old Republic For Revenue Losses


swtor 2014-10-23 22-17-20-11

While Bioware has wasted no time discussing how popular The Old Republic is, revealing at Gamescom that over one million players log in monthly, with Super Data Research placing the MMO as among the top ten revenue generators in 2014. In fact it looks like the only people that The Old Republic is currently letting down are the executives at Electronic Arts. In its latest quarterly report, EA Games noted $454 million in revenue over the past three months, primarily driven by FIFA, Titanfall, and Battlefield 4 Premium Edition.

Not all of EA’s properties were up to projections, however, as the company blamed several of its products for a $400 million decrease in revenue.

This increase was partially offset by a $413 million decrease in revenue primarily from the SimCity, Crysis, Dead Space, and The Sims franchises, and Star Wars: The Old Republic.

SimCity and The Old Republic are both responsible for a combined $63 million decrease in revenue, according to another section of the report. It is important to note that both monetary figures are decreases based on internal projections for the quarter, and do not conclude that any of the related studios are running at a loss.

(Source: EA Games Filing)

Webzen Posts 67% Drop In Annual Profits


archlords

Webzen has released their 2013 earnings release, and the results are a mixture of bad and probably salvageable. Despite a 26% rise in revenue over last year, operating profits dropped by 67%. To put the loss into better perspective, Webzen’s 2012 revenue amounted to $53.6 million USD (approximately), with $45.6 million of that going toward operating expenses, leaving around $8 million left as operating profit and that doesn’t even factor in taxes. In 2013, while revenue gained 26% to $67.47 million, operating costs surged even higher by 42% to $64.87 million. So while revenues grew during the year, operating costs resulted in the final operating profit plummeting.

With a number of titles still in development, Webzen’s portfolio is looking rather slim at the moment. The last year saw the shuttering of Archlord, SUN, and Arctic Combat, with only two of the four games currently listed on Webzen’s global website actually being playable. Games like R2 and Mu Rebirth are still “upcoming,” with development continuing on other titles including Archlord 2. Also worth noting is that revenue from domestic sales fell slightly while overseas grew by a wide margin to 73% of Webzen’s total revenue.

Another factor of operating cost could be related to Webzen’s 100% acquisition of gPotato.com back in February.

(Source: Webzen Earnings)

NCSoft Q1 2013 Finances


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(I apologize for the outdated screenshot. I will update with a graph once I’m in front of a real computer.)

NCSoft has released their first quarterly report for 2013, and I’m sure we are all wondering how Guild Wars 2 will perform following the initial rush, so let’s dive in. Sales remained strong in 2013 thanks to Guild Wars 2, Aion, and Lineage. Profit is understandably down since last quarter’s launch of Guild Wars 2, however NCSoft’s year over year figures are amazing: 31% higher sales, 348% increased profits, 256% pre-tax income, and 322% net income over Q1 2012.

Lineage 1 continues to be NCSoft’s big seller, consisting of 38% of the total game sales in Q1, with Guild Wars 2 at 21% and Aion at 16%. Aion and Lineage saw an increase in sales quarter over quarter while Lineage II, Guild Wars, and Blade & Soul saw a mild to heavy loss. NCSoft as a parent company has thankfully recovered from being in the red last quarter for pre-tax income and net income.

Korea remains NCSoft’s largest market at 64%, with North America and Europe dropping by about half to 13% and 8% respectively, Japan’s 7% percentage share remained the same even though sales dropped. Sales in Taiwan increased slightly, remaining at 1%. Royalties dropped about one third in total, remaining at the 6% percentage value from the last quarter.

As usual, Guild Wars is bundled in with the “other” and is not represented by its own category. For legal reasons, I must remind you that these results are un-audited and may be subject to change during the auditing process.

NCSoft Q4 2012 Records Historical High Quarterly Revenue


ncsoftq412
Click me for a bigger picture.

Talk about springing back. Strong sales in Lineage, Guild Wars 2, Blade & Soul, as well as mobile games, NCSoft has recorded historical high quarterly revenues for the fourth quarter of 2012. In the latest report, NCSoft marked a 56% increase in quarterly sales, a 208% increase in quarterly operating profit, 110% increase in pre-tax income, as well as a 116% quarterly increase in net income. The fourth quarter saw moderate to high increases in sales for Lineage, Lineage II, with the sales from Guild Wars 2 nearly tripling during the same period. Aion, as well as NCsoft’s latest title, Blade & Soul, saw marginal decreases over the same time period. Lineage II managed to reverse, at least for this quarter, a downward trend in sales that began in Q4 2011 while the original Lineage continues on an unpredictable, yet averaging upward, trend in sales despite its age.

Guild Wars 2 has already proven itself as NCSoft’s most successful product to date, breaking the record set by Aion during its peak sales by a long shot. NCsoft’s parent-company reports are, sadly, not as inspiring. While sales went up 15% quarterly, quarterly operating profit went down 1% with pre-tax income and net income both falling hard and ending up in the red for Q4.

And to wrap this up, we’ll look at everyone’s favorite part of NCSoft’s quarterly reports: Demographics. As expected from the launch of Guild Wars 2 and Blade & Soul, sales in Korea shot up with North America and Europe also taking a dramatic shift upward. Sales in Japan and Taiwan mostly remained the same while sales from royalties were boosted slightly.