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Despite Star Wars: Battlefront 2 Controversy, EA Just Had A Record Year

"Our success is driven by the way we have changed, and continue to change, our relationship with players."

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Electronic Arts today reported earnings for its fiscal fourth quarter and the company had a record year, despite all the noise and controversy surrounding Star Wars: Battlefront II.

For the full year ended March 31, EA pulled in revenue of $5.15 billion (up 6.2 percent), while profit was $1.04 billion (up 7.9 percent). Results were rosy for the fiscal fourth quarter, too. Revenue for the period jumped 3.6 percent to $1.582 billion with profit up 7.2 percent to $607 million. (Percentage changes provided by GI.biz).

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Now Playing: Star Wars: Battlefront 2 -- Using The Lowest Settings To Make An Ugly Movie | Potato Mode

The good times for EA are expected to roll on in the current fiscal year. EA said it expects to make $5.6 billion in revenue for the period and a profit of $1.11 billion. EA's lineup of big-name, revenue-driving titles for the year include BioWare's new IP Anthem, the next Battlefield game, all the EA Sports games, and whatever other surprises may be in store.

"Fiscal 2018 was a year of strong growth and continued transformation for Electronic Arts, as we expanded the reach of our leading franchises like FIFA, Battlefield, and The Sims to more players across more platforms and geographies," EA CEO Andrew Wilson said. "In the year ahead, we will expand the world of play with amazing new experiences and new IP, more competition, and industry-leading subscription programs. There has never been a more exciting time to be engaging and entertaining global communities."

EA CFO Blake Jorgensen added, "Our success is driven by the way we have changed, and continue to change, our relationship with players. They want more depth in their favorite games, and fresh content that can hold their attention year-round. This has made our business much more stable and enabled us to deliver a dependable and growing cash flow to investors."

In the wake of massive criticism from fans, EA removed microtransactions from Star Wars: Battlefront II just before the game launched in November 2017. Microtransactions were added back in April, so whatever revenue EA has made and continues to make from them will not be publicised until EA's next earnings report later this year.

Unsurprisingly, it was EA's digital business that helped spur growth during the year. What EA calls "digital net bookings"--which include mobile, full-game downloads, and "live services" i.e. microtransactions--surged 17 percent to reach $3.538 billion during the year. Here are some other takeaways from EA's report today:

  • "Nearly 18 million players engaged in competitive gaming across FIFA 18 and Madden NFL 18, up more than 75% year-over-year."
  • "The Battlefield community, across current generation consoles and PC HD, now has more than 54 million players life to date."
  • "The Sims community had more than 80 million Sims players across PC and mobile in fiscal 2018."

For more on EA's earnings report today, check out the additional stories linked below.

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Meta_sentinel

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The vast majority of casual gamers do not visit gaming sites or follow gaming news. Sadly, products will still sell despite backlash.

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DragonAgeLore

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What Battlefront 2 controversy?

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jyml8582

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dumbass sheeps would pretty much swallow any shit with pretty commercials.

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kachal

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Edited By kachal

@jyml8582 *sheep

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Ant_17

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Wow, we suck.

All that lootbox thing and we did nothing in the end.

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smashthestars

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@Ant_17: I didn't buy the game, not much more to do other than that.

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PETERAKO

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Edited By PETERAKO

indifference and/or ignorance is rewarding EA big time, though I think the majority of people would be indifferent anyway. As if Chad, the dudebro fratboy would care for anything more than just his rims on his hummer.

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deactivated-5b06d816c3f07

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It's easy not to support EA. Their games suck

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videogameninja

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-“Our success is driven by..."-

Lootboxes… er, I mean… micro-transactions… Ugh, I mean…. Great quality games and services that would make gamers all around the globe proud.

-RIIIGGHHHTTTT… NINJA APPROVED-

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GleenCross

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Edited By GleenCross

They have soccer and american football to boost their sales. The kind of public who buy these games every year for "updated" rosters (and I know this very well, played NBA 2K for almost 10 years before abandoning the hobby), this public don't give a shit about the game industry in general. Also the pay to win smartphone games, etc.. The actual AAA games, Battlefield 1 is a partial failure because most players are not buying their "premium" stuff and the playerbase mingles constantly. Battlefront 2 I don't really know because I didn't bought it, but we can assume it's hard to find players there as well. But other than that, Madden and Fifa remains as strong as ever, even NBA live sold a decent amount, etc... EA built their empire using sports, they remain strong because of the same sport games. And like I said, usually you see people struggling to abandon the hobby because it's just as casual as it gets. Here in my country I know some people who plays soccer games since the PS1 era. Winning Elleven, PES, Fifa, etc.. you name it, it's such a casual "killtime" thing, they don't even notice lol I only abandoned basketball games because both 2K and Live are just awful, but if the game was still playable, that alone and my passion for basketball would make me return for one more season (literally).

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asnakeneverdies

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For the Romans, it was lead poisoning. For us, microtransactions.

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ASneakyPoptart

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Edited By ASneakyPoptart

Good for them, I guess? People can spend their money how they want, but the fact that I didn't buy any EA games gives me a peace of mind that I'm not contributing to the dark side of gaming.

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PETERAKO

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@asneakypoptart: at this point "people spending their money how they want" is not all that different from "toddler sticks metal object in wall plug"

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Dinosaur_Teeth

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@PETERAKO: EA KILLS BABIES: CONFIRMED ?

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PETERAKO

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@dinosaur_teeth: laugh it up all you want. If they could make money off of it and get away with it, they would tottaly kill babies.

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Dinosaur_Teeth

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@PETERAKO: HahaHoHoHoHahaha!!!

Now that's taken care of: Why kill future consumers though?

Even EA knows that's a big NoNo...

EA is Pro-Life: CONFIRMED

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PETERAKO

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Edited By PETERAKO

@dinosaur_teeth: coca cola hired hitmen to kill dissenting workers in colombia. Do they know it was a big NoNo? You bet they do. Did it stop them? No.

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Dinosaur_Teeth

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@PETERAKO: Meh, that happened at a bottling plant owned by a Franchiser, in Columbia...

Incidentally, Columbia has the highest assassination rate for Union Officials (like the 9 from Coke since, eh, 2001 I think...

I'm more convinced this is a conflict of Culture and Business, rather than some guy in a 3 piece suit in an office in Manhattan...

Furthermore, Union Bosses aren't so much Future Customers as Leaches, so there's that too...

EA is still Pro-Life: CONFIRMED

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TiringPillow

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Just goes to show you that microtransactions do in fact pay

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