Lady Dimitrescu Conquered the Market; Resident Evil Village is Fastest-selling Game in the Series
Resident Evil Village's great sales aren't Capcom's only success. The company is in its fifth year with record financial results.
Not only EA and Ubisoft can boast of success of their brands. Also Capcom has reasons to be happy after another fiscal year. Resident Evil Village is the fastest-selling installment of the series and, among other things, thanks to it 2021 was the most profitable year in the history of the Japanese publisher.
Lady Dimitrescu conquered the market
Eleven months after its release, the latest Resident Evil sold more than 6.1 million copies. Thus, the 8th installment is slowly catching up with the 2019's Resident Evil 2 (9.3 million) and Resident Evil VII: Biohazard (10.6 million). Malicious people could add that this is due to Lady Dimitrescu's "assets", who quickly gained adoration of players.
Let's just mention that both titles are among the top three best-selling games in Capcom's history. They are bested only by Monster Hunter: World, which was purchased 17.8 million times. It is worth noting, however, that the publisher lists all game releases separately, including re-releases (for example Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil 4 HD, which together have sold 10 million copies).
In total, 32.6 million copies of Capcom games were shipped in fiscal year 2021 (ended on March 31, 2022), which is a record result for the publisher. This is thanks to new, warmly received games: not only Resident Evil Village but also, among others, Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin.
Capcom once again with record earnings
Great game sales translated into excellent financial results. Capcom has recorded, for the fifth year in a row, an increase in sales (to 110 billion yen, or about $800 million) and operating profit (to 42.9 billion yen, or about $320 million). In both cases, these are record results for the Japanese publisher, which hopes to repeat the feat in the next 12 months.
New games on the way
How does Capcom want to accomplish this feat? By releasing "many new titles" in fiscal year 2023. The company is preparing 45 new SKUs, noting that a single game released on multiple platforms will have a separate SKU ID for each platform.
This takes into account Monster Hunter: Rise - Sunbreak announced for June (PC / Switch) and presumably Street Fighter VI and various DLCs, but we do not know anything about other items. The presentation attached to the financial report suggests that it is not about mobile games, as in this segment Capcom is supposed to "focus on managing current titles".
All this is expected to help Capcom sell 37 million copies of games in fiscal year 2023. In addition, the company plans to advertise the Capcom Pro Tour 2022 e-sports tournament and is counting on the success of the Resident Evil from Netflix.
