Capcom has released its financial results for the fiscal year ending 31 March 2023, revealing a sixth consecutive year of record profits and sustained growth across the business. While the report noted potentially volatile behaviours in future, based on ‘diverging user needs and changes in market conditions’ it appears these changes are yet to impact overall sales as the company has continued to thrive under difficult economic circumstances.
Net sales for the company grew 14.4% year-on-year in FY23, from ¥110.1 billion to ¥125.9 billion. Operating income similarly rose, by around 18.4%.
Much of this success can be attributed to new games in the Capcom catalog, including the success of Resident Evil 4 and Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak, which both contributed significantly to a whopping 41.7 million games sold in the fiscal year.
Read: Resident Evil 4 remake review: A horror classic revitalised
According to a breakdown from Capcom, 80.3% of games were sold in overseas markets, while 19.7% were sold in Japan. Perhaps the more intriguing figure is that only 10.6% of these sales were noted as being physical. As of this FY2023 report, a whopping 89.4% of Capcom game sales were for digital units.
Around 29.7% of these total sales were for new games like Resident Evil 4 (3.75 million units sold) and Monster Hunter: Sunbreak (5.45 million units sold). The rest of the games sold (70.3%) were catalog titles, defined as games that have launched earlier than the current fiscal year.
Of these, there were notable sales for: Monster Hunter Rise, Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil 3, Devil May Cry 5, Resident Evil Village, and Resident Evil 7 biohazard.
The outlier amongst these is Devil May Cry 5, which launched in 2019 and has managed to regain a footing in the FY23 game sales charts, despite being absent in FY21 and FY22. This could speak to a resurgence of the franchise, a potential spike due to game discounts, or other factors.
Whatever the case, it appears Capcom is currently enjoying robust growth across its most popular franchises. In FY2024, this success is expected to continue, as the company’s next fiscal year will play host to the launch of the highly-anticipated Street Fighter 6, dinosaur survival game Exoprimal, and other unannounced projects.
