Game news This Japanese publisher sold more games on PC than on all consoles combined this year, it’s a radical change for the Japanese industry
Published on 02/11/2024 at 5:35 p.m.
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If Japanese video games have experienced periods of slack, the Japanese scene has largely returned to its shortcomings for several years, to the point of once again becoming one of the most prosperous scenes in the industry.
The day Japan stopped spinning
In the second half of the 2000s, particularly with the arrival of the first HD consoles with the PS3 and the Xbox 360, Japanese video games were experiencing a major crisis. In fact, at that time, the Japanese industry had the greatest difficulty adapting to new trends and new consolesleading not only to games heavily criticized by the press and the public but also to sluggish sales, in any case far from the heyday of the country’s industry.
It took ten years but things have changed a lot since then and Japanese video games have largely recovered. Driven by original works, the reinvention of some of its most popular licenses and the elimination of delays in porting its games to the West, the Japanese industry has now largely made up for the delay it may have accumulated in the past. Clear evidence of this change: Capcom recently revealed that it sells more than half of its games on PC.
PC and dematerialized sales
Indeed, the Japanese company recently published its financial results for the first half of the fiscal year. Reported by the Games Industry websiteCapcom’s report shows slightly lower sales compared to last year but which should still allow them to reach their end-of-year objective. More surprisingly, the Japanese publisher revealed that 54% of its game sales were on PC compared to 40% shared by consoles Switch, PlayStation and Xbox. A division to which must be added the domination of the dematerialized format in the publisher’s game sales since the latter declares that 93.7% of its game sales were digital sales.
It must be said that the industry has changed profoundly since the years 2000-2010, having experienced a rise in digital platforms such as Steam, the PlayStation Store or the Microsoft Store. Likewise, publishers now favor a simultaneous release of their game on all platforms and across the world (apart from possible exclusivity agreements), where, 10 years ago, some Japanese games were published in the West several months after their release in Japan or even several years later on PC. Now accustomed to simultaneous releases, players do not hide their new appreciation for Japanese video games and with the upcoming releases of the Capcom Fighting Collection 2 and above all Monster Hunter Wilds, the firm’s hope of meeting its end-of-fiscal-year targets seems entirely plausible.
