Kotaku: Earnings

Ubisoft: Years Of Assassin's Creed To Come

Leigh Alexander — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:20:00 MDT

Assassin's Creed as a brand will be around for "years to come," Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot said during today's conference call.

Assassin's Creed has sold 6 million units since launch, Guillemot said, as he summarized a corporate strategy that relies on enduring in-house brands balanced against the introduction of new franchises.

No mention of February 2008's Assassin's Creed: Altaïr's Chronicles for DS was made during the call, but Ubisoft's enthusiasm for the original game's "better-than-expected" performance seemed to indicate an interest in more adventures for Altaïr in the future.

Take-Two Only Lost $38 Million Last Quarter, Seems Pleased

Michael McWhertor — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 20:40:11 MDT

Take-Two Interactive had plenty to sing about today. There was the official word on BioShock 2, even more Carnival Games for little girls and boys to enjoy and a reaffirmation of Grand Theft Auto IV's worldwide ship date of April 29. Yay! Sure, there were some delays, but all in all, not bad. The best news? The company managed to only lose 38 million bucks in its first fiscal quarter of 2008! That's better than the Take-Two gang had expected, with Strauss Zelnick, Chairman of Take-Two, saying he was "pleased." This is how you lose money, people—with a faint hint of a smile on your face.

In a call to investors and analysts, Zelnick and crew chalked up the better than planned for quarter to sales of stuff like Carnival Games and Manhunt 2, plus portions of Take-Two's back catalog. I'm not much of a gambler, but I'd be willing to wager that next quarter, they'll do much, much better.

Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. Reports First Quarter Fiscal 2008 Financial Results [Take-Two]

Ubisoft Makes Money, Plans More Prince of Persia

Michael McWhertor — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 15:40:13 MST

French publisher Ubisoft was rather pleased with itself for its performance for the previous quarter, raking in some $650 million in revenue on strong sales of Assassin's Creed and some Petz or Babyz nonsense. Whatever the cause, champagne corks were popping on news that sales were up some 44% over the same quarter the previous year. Good news for those at Ubi, but maybe not for someone looking to acquire the company.

The only bad news? Haze was pushed back. Again. Prince of Persia fans, however, have something to look forward to.

The financial results from Ubi reveal that the publisher has yet another Prince of Persia game officially in the works, planned for fiscal year 2008-09. We've heard about it before, though, as rumors of a Prince of Persia: Ghosts of the Past arrived later last year alongside supposed screen shots.

It should really be no surprise that Ubi is banking on another Prince game—it's been two years since the last console release, after all. Plus, there's a movie coming that will "synergize" nicely. We're just assuming that whatever the publisher has planned for the series, it's coming to the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Maybe even the Wii. And PC. Possibly the PSP and Nintendo DS. Some calculator watches....

Ubisoft Reports 2007-08 Third Quarter Results (PDF) [Ubisoft]

GameStop Raking In The Dough, Another Record Quarter

Mark Wilson — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 13:20:22 MST

If we could do the whole birth thing all over again, we would make sure that GameStop was our uncle. Because their sales last quarter were through the roof, rising 59% from last year and totaling $1.6 billion. Hardware sales and software sales both had large gains, with the top titles being Madden NFL 08, Guitar Hero III, BioShock and Wii Play. Now we understand where GameStop got all that cash to open over 5,000 stores. You know, us.

GameStop Raises Forecast on Record Q3 [nextgeneration]

Guitar Hero III Sales Break $100 Mil In Seven Days

Michael McWhertor — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 17:20:05 MST

It may not have been the biggest entertainment launch event of the year, or however Halo 3's launch was marketed by the team at Microsoft, but Activision's haul for the launch week of Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock was more than respectable. The company posted quarterly earnings today—some $317 million and a record for Activision—bolstered by healthy sales of the fourth game in the Guitar Hero series.

The company expects an even better follow-up quarter with something along the lines of a billion dollars in revenue, a good portion of it spread across the four separate releases of Guitar Hero III.

Guitar Hero Leads Activision's Record Q2 [Next-Gen]

Microsoft's Games Division Doesn't Lose Money Again

Michael McWhertor — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 16:40:00 MDT

What a difference $330 million in sales of Halo 3 can make. The regularly unprofitable Entertainment and Devices Division, in which the Xbox business resides over at old Microsoft, came up for air this past quarter, posting $165 million in income for the Redmond behemoth, celebrating the second profitable quarter for the games division since its inception. Microsoft points to strong sales of Halo 3, the Xbox 360 and video game accessories as revenue drivers, helping the entire E&D Division pull in some $1.93 billion for the first fiscal quarter.

According the quarterly earnings release, Microsoft shipped 1.8 million Xbox 360s to market, twice that of the previous quarter. The company expects that for the rest of the fiscal year, revenue for the fun side of Microsoft will improve based on "increased sales of Xbox 360 consoles and related games, accessories, and services, and sales of Zune products." Go Zune!

For those keeping score, Sony lost a bunch of money, Nintendo made a fuck-ton of money and Microsoft performed solidly, if not spectacularly. See you next quarter!

Best Buy's Big Game Gains

Mike Fahey — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 13:40:08 MST

Best Buy definitely owes each and every one of us a cookie. The retail juggernaut has reported its profits for the third quarter, seeing a double digit gain in entertainment software sales. This effectively makes gamers and gamer enablers responsible for 17% of their $8.5 billion revenue for the period, due in no small part to the new console launches.

Despite our best efforts they still managed to miss projections, with profits only up $12 million from last year's $138 million, which is probably due in no small part to all that space taken up by CDs that no one buys. They should probably just replace that section with more video games. They can pay me for that suggestion when they deliver my cookie. Michael Fahey

Best Buy Sees Double-Digit Gains In Gaming Sales [Gamasutra]