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"Substantially improved" profitability for games doesn't prevent sales dip for Sega

Bullet Club

Member
"Substantially improved" profitability for games doesn't prevent sales dip for Sega

But publisher still confident net sales will rise to $3.6 billion for the financial year

Sega Sammy has released its latest financial results which, while not showing dramatic improvement across the company, do indicate its games business is in rude health.

The Japanese publisher reported net sales of ¥165.5 billion ($1.53 billion) for the six months ended September 30, a slight decline of 3.2% when compared to the same period last year.

Operating income, however, is up 43% year-on-year to ¥14.6 billion ($134.9 million).

The bulk of Sega Sammy's revenues still come from its Entertainment Contents business, which encompasses video games (including mobile titles and Apple Arcade revenues), as well as amusement machines, animated films and toys.

The net sales for this division during the first half of the financial year were reported as ¥115.9 billion ($1.07 billion), up 8% year-on-year. Operating income more than doubled to ¥12.8 billion ($118.2 million).

The publisher sold 11.37 million packaged games, including the newly launched Mega Drive Mini. This is a slight improvement on the 11.18 million sold in the same period last year.

Sega notes that the profitability for this segment is "substantially improved" thanks to ongoing revenues from past titles and decreased costs following a impairment loss the publisher reported during the previous fiscal year.

The company is hoping future releases, including Persona 5 The Royal and Mario & Sonic At The Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, will improve on this further.

Looking ahead, Sega Sammy's forecast for the full year aims for net sales of ¥390 billion ($3.6 billion), which would be a 17.6% improvement on the previous financial year. Operating income is expected to increase by 106.4% to ¥27 billion ($249.5 million).

Source: Gaming Industry
 

Carna

Banned
Sega has so many great franchises they could exploit that they instead leave to rot. It's hard to feel bad for them.
They been focusing on going back to old franchises recently, especially a new Sakura wars game coming to the west in 2020. What franchises do you have in mind? Another Key set radio?
 

DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
SEGA needs a "come to SEGA" moment. Remember thine own history. Smaller companies like SNK and PSiKYO are making bank by just porting their old stuff. SEGA is leaving money on the table and misreading the market. ATLUS's back catalogue could also be leveraged.

SEGA could easily churn out several volumes of "SEGA classic collections" if they ever happened to remember they made systems other than the Genesis.
 
Well, I got the Genesis Mini if that means anything xD. Also looking forward to the Panzer Dragoon remakes on Steam once those drop.

TBH I don't think the problem is that SEGA isn't embracing more of their legacy stuff. They have a spiritual sequel in the form of SEGA World Drivers Championship, a new House of the Dead (Scarlet Dawn), the new Monkey Ball game coming etc. Honestly I think the bigger issues are that some of their releases haven't always been where they should (Championship and Scarlet Dawn are both arcade/FEC-only for now, the former only in Japan at that), and it just feels like marketing for lots of SEGA's stuff is nonexistent.

Though the latter, has sometimes always felt like the case even back to the Genesis days. Oh sure, they always made well to market the consoles (particularly Genesis/MegaDrive and Dreamcast) and show off some of the games coming with them, but marketing for very specific games? Wasn't always that common. Aside from Sonic games, I'd suppose.

And I guess by "marketing" in this context, I'm referring to things beyond gaming magazine adverts. Feels like SEGA always held back on marketing budgets for a lot of their titles, even in America. Even nowadays, where are the Persona and Yakuza ads on TV? Where are the sponsored stream events? VF6 would get pretty damn big if they did something like the CPT to offer cash prizes (which let's be honest, that's the reason 90% of pros have stuck with the game. Thankfully it improved a ton in the meantime, even if single-player content's still a bit barebones).

Yeah they have the Twitter accounts but it should be more than that, regularly, and for more than just Sonic and the occasional game or two. Anyone have any insight on how they market stuff in Japan? Would be an interesting point of comparison.
 
A Phantasy Star, whether online or no, will print them money. Or even a remake of the Panzer series.

They're already doing Panzer remakes (just 1 and 2 so far, no word on Saga). MS featured some PSO game getting localized in their E3 this year (was one of the standout trailers for me, personally).

Wouldn't mind a classic/offline style Phantasy Star handled by Atlus tbh; I know they gave them autonomy but c'mon, they're a JRPG powerhouse in their own right these days. They'd probably be up to crate dig some of SEGA's older IP if given the chance.
 

Crew 511A

Member
I'd kill for a new Shining Force game. Not the stuff we got after Shining Force 3. A real Shining Force game. I'd settle for an HD version of Shining Force 3. Just bring it back.

Is there a reason they aren't bringing games like Scud Racer or Golden Axe 2 RoDA to consoles? Seems like they are just leaving money on the table.

For me, the best Sega game of the last decade was Sonic Mania, and that wasn't even made by Sega. It's telling how far they have fallen.
 
As long as they keep pumping out yakuza games, I'm good.

That's arguably part of the problem; Yakuza's a fun series but it isn't enough on its own. When Judgement was announced I was super-hyped because it seemed like it was gonna be some crazy cyberpunk-ish stuff with you riding around the city on Motor Raid bikes and using that stuff in combos, etc. But it's more or less another Yakuza game.

Which, again, it's great for what it is. But there's arguably better IP they're sitting on and haven't done anything with for years.
 

Tenaciousmo

Member
Which, again, it's great for what it is. But there's arguably better IP they're sitting on and haven't done anything with for years.
I get that, but their other franchise don't talk to me on the level of the yakuza games. except maybe virtua fighters, alpha protocol, binary domain, & anarchy reigns/ Vanquish.

shoutout to space channel 5 coming to PSVR tho
 
I get that, but their other franchise don't talk to me on the level of the yakuza games. except maybe virtua fighters, alpha protocol, binary domain, & anarchy reigns/ Vanquish.

shoutout to space channel 5 coming to PSVR tho

That's understandable. Guess it's just the nature of things when a company's made so many damn IPs over the years (and with such different identities over the various period phases, at that).

I'm more into the early-mid '90s to early '00s stuff, personally, but Yakuza definitely has a lot of charm to it. The other games like Binary Domain and Alien:Isolation seem to be pretty well-received overall as well.
 

ViperZombie

Neo Member
I'm a massive Sega fan and I can't understand why after decades of collections which always have the same games on them they won't do a collection of classic 3D sega games (virtua fighter, burning rangers, jet set radio, that PS2 Shinobi game, etc).
 
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