The Konami miracle happened again this year. Absent from AAA gaming debates for years and snubbed by nostalgic fans, the Japanese publisher is posting the best results in its history with a turnover of 2.2 billion euros and above all a frankly impressive operating profit which stands at 555 million euros.
Let’s immediately silence a tenacious received idea: these results, Konami does not owe them to its secondary businesses such as pachinko / pachislot, casinos or sports halls. Over the fiscal year, these activities cumulate an operating profit of 58 million euros, which is not nothing but remains very far from the video game, which brings in 572 million euros over the same period. In fact, if we stick purely to video games, no Japanese publisher is currently doing better than Konami. Including Bandai Namco which, however transfigured by the cardboard of Elden Ring, must be satisfied with an operational profit of 522 million euros.
Konami’s recipe continues to rely on a small number of highly profitable mobile games, namely eFootball PES 2021, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links and Professional Baseball Spirits Ace which remains the benchmark of its kind in Japan. At the same time and still in the free-to-play department, Konami met with great success with the global and multiplatform launch of Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel, which has exceeded 30 million downloads. eFootball 2022 would have liked to be able to say the same, but Konami obviously remains discreet about the performance of the successor to PES. Released in November 2019 but still a contributor, the Switch’s Momotaro Dentetsu has exceeded 3.5 million copies sold in Japan.
For the new fiscal year, Konami expects a turnover up 7% (close to 2.4 billion) and an operating profit which would also set a new record at 572 million euros. This progression would not be due to video games, the result of which is expected at exactly the same level, but to the other segments which can only get better since the end of the confinements, in particular casinos and sports halls.