Electronic Arts, EA, has released its figures for the last quarter of 2019 and discussed them. Once again, there is a lot of praise for the shooter Apex Legends, and Battlefield 6 is already receiving early accolades. Only the poor Anthem is almost completely ignored.
What kind of event is this? EA presented its financial report for the 3rd financial quarter of 2019, which is the quarter that ended on December 31, 2019. This is the quarter where the Christmas business is so important.
Here are the key figures and insights:
The big winner was “Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order”, which was a hit. While “Battlefield V” flopped during the same period last year, Fallen Order exceeded expectations.
It is said, “Fallen Order was the action-adventure that fans were waiting for during the Christmas season.”
Thanks to Fallen Order and the ongoing games FIFA, Madden NFL, Apex Legend, and Sims 4, the quarter went “excellently,” according to CEO Andrew Wilson.
Compared to the weak 2018, which was hurt by the disappointing Battlefield V, revenues in the Christmas quarter of 2019 rose significantly. Only mobile struggled a bit, with revenues down 6%.
Microtransactions remain important for EA. They generated nearly 1 billion US dollars in the Christmas quarter of 2020; most of the money comes from sports games like FIFA 20.
Which games are being praised? Apex Legends is being showered with praise. It has supposedly “taken the industry by storm,” with Season 3 being larger than Season 2 with higher peaks. Apex Legends is now expected to come to China and other platforms. EA also has big plans for eSports.
The next Battlefield (probably Battlefield 6) is scheduled for fiscal year 2022 (between April 2021 and March 2022). EA intends to take advantage of the fact that many already have the PS5 and Xbox Series X and expects high profits from the new Battlefield. It is said that after the changes in the management in Stockholm, there has been a “really strong traction” with Battlefield 6. CEO Andrew Wilson says he is excited about what the team is doing there.
Star Wars Battlefront 2 is receiving praise – the game has improved significantly over the last 2 years.
FIFA and Madden are also highlighted. EA speaks highly of both.
What about Anthem? Anthem was mentioned only once in the call. And that was as “2019 was the spring quarter strongly influenced by the launch of Apex Legends and Anthem,” otherwise the blockbuster from a year ago was not mentioned at all.
Supposedly, BioWare is working behind closed doors on a rework of Anthem. However, EA does not mention this at all.
Hopefully, Anthem does not face this fate.
In the last quarterly report, EA at least mentioned that Anthem was getting new content, which later turned out to be a winter event. Even that is now missing.
Anthem is getting smaller, Apex Legends larger
This is what’s behind it: One can see that Anthem is gradually fading into the background in the financial reports each quarter, while Apex Legends becomes more and more prominent.
Just like Anthem, WildStar once faced a similar fate, as it eventually disappeared from the quarterly figures and graphs of publisher NCSoft, gradually being phased out when it became clear that the MMORPG would no longer recover.
Hopefully, Anthem does not face this fate.
