Seven billion euros in turnover for 1.2 billion euros in net profit: this is a convincing exercise that Electronic Arts has just delivered, still driven by its timeless sports games and more precisely EA Sports FC and Madden NFL. Madden NFL 24 is the best-selling episode since the early 2000s and. EA will capitalize on American football with EA Sports College Football 25, the university version which succeeds NCAA Football, which has been missing for more than 10 years.
If the results seem to imply that EA Sports FC 24 did not make more sales than FIFA 23, we nevertheless know that the brand change went very well. “ FC is more than just a game, it’s the world’s first digital football fan platform – and that’s just the beginning », Announces CEO Andrew Wilson. In the microtransactions department, the increase in revenue from FC Ultimate Team and FC Mobile also offset the decline in Apex Legends.
Apex Legends, in fact, has totaled a turnover of 3.4 billion dollars since its debut in 2019. As a reminder, Respawn’s battle royale reached its first billion in May 2021 and 2 billion in May 2022. If the revenues have slowed down and the franchise has missed the move to mobile, EA is pleased to have listened to the community to make many changes and make the game more accessible. “ Looking ahead, we will continue to invest in expanding the audience by building on the epic characters and storytelling of this world that goes beyond the current Battle Royale. »
Football has (not) changed
While waiting for the new generation of The Sims, Electronic Arts also remains very attached to the Maxis game, which still provides it with the big numbers it loves so much. Please note that The Sims 4 has exceeded 85 million players and that The Sims Online and The Sims Mobile have more than 500 million downloads. “ It’s already one of the largest communities in the world, and we believe this successful franchise has the potential to become one of the biggest creative platforms in entertainment. »
Impatient to be able to turn the page on Battlefield 2042 for good, Andrew Wilson also has a word for the next Battlefield project, around which the DICE, Ripple Effect, Criterion and more recently Motive studios are gathered. “ This is the largest Battlefield team in franchise history. A few weeks ago I visited the teams and I couldn’t be more excited about what they showed and what we got to play. »
Let us add that financial director Stuart Canfield still had the presence of mind to once mention Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, as a significant contributor to game sales turnover. The sales in question generated 1.86 billion euros over the entire annual financial year, but it is the sales of additional content and other microtransactions that do the heavy lifting with 5.14 billion euros. We also know the breakdown of turnover by platform: with 4.29 billion euros, consoles remain far ahead of PC (1.59 billion euros) and mobile (1.12 billion euros) .
For the new fiscal year from April 2024 to March 2025, Electronic Arts has already released Tales of Kenzera: Zau and will follow with EA Sports F1 24 (May 31), EA Sports College Football 25, EA Sports Madden NFL 25, EA Sports FC 25 and EA Sports NHL 25. Fortunately for non-sports enthusiasts, Electronic Arts has two other games in the works by the end of the year. One is an as-yet unannounced “partner game” while the other is a game from an in-house studio. So much for the suspense, because according to the journalist https://twitter.com/JeffGrubb/status/1787946128903643502, it is simply Dragon Age: The Implacable Wolf. BioWare’s big return would therefore finally take place at the end of 2024 or at the beginning of 2025. As a reminder, the franchise remains on Dragon Quest: Inquisition from 2014.
