“Game On” is The Fly's weekly recap of the stories that strengthen or undermine video game stocks.
New release: Among this week's notable game releases are Microsoft (MSFT) 2022 title “Grounded” ported to Nintendo Switch (NTDOY), PlayStation 4 (Sony), PS5 will be released on April 16th. This week, Square Enix's (SQNXF) “Final Fantasy XVI: The Rising Tide'' is a downloadable expansion for the 2023 PlayStation 5 game “Final Fantasy XVI,'' released on April 18th.
Take-two layoffs: On Tuesday, Take-Two's board of directors (Two) has approved a cost reduction program to identify efficiencies across the business and improve the company's profitability while continuing to invest in growth. As part of these efforts, the company said it will “streamline our pipeline, eliminate some projects in development, and streamline our organizational structure to reduce headcount and future hiring needs.” . The company estimates it will incur fees totaling about $160 million to $200 million related to this plan. The company expects between $40 million and $60 million of the total charges to result in future cash outlays. Total costs include approximately $120 million to $140 million related to title cancellation, approximately $25 million to $35 million related to employee severance and employee-related costs, and office space reductions. Consists of approximately $15 million to $25 million in related amounts. The plan is expected to be largely completed by Dec. 31, and will reduce the company's workforce by about 5%.
In response to this move, Jefferies believes that the 5% workforce reduction and cancellation of some titles will be positive for the stock price, as it will lead to improved profit margins in fiscal 2026 after the release of “Grand Theft Auto VI”. He said there was. The analyst added that FY2025 guidance and “GTA VI” are “likely to remain paramount” in Q4 results, maintaining a “buy” rating on Take-Two stock and a $195 price target.
fall out: During the release of Amazon Prime Video (AMZN) series “Fallout” debuted last week, and many games in the long-running role-playing game series have seen an increase in both player numbers and sales. Circana analyst Mat Piscatella said Fallout 76, released in 2018 by Microsoft-owned Bethesda, recently had the highest engagement rate on an Xbox Series console since October 2022. said. Furthermore, according to Steam DB, Fallout 4's active player count on Steam in 2015 rose from a peak of 24,000 last week to more than 83,000 by the end of last week, according to Kotaku's John Walker. Fallout: New Vegas” and “Fallout 76” also saw notable spikes in player numbers on the PC gaming platform. Walker also pointed out that Fallout 4 and Fallout 76 have been at the top of the Steam sales charts over the past week. The Fly points out that Bethesda, which Microsoft acquired in 2021, has been publishing games in the Fallout series since 2008's Fallout 3.
Meanwhile, Bethesda announced on April 11 that Fallout 4 would be upgraded to current-gen consoles on April 25, the same day the Amazon Prime series first became available. This title was originally released for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox. One is free and optimized for Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5, giving players stability improvements and fixes, as well as performance and quality mode settings.
UK market: The UK games market was worth £7.82 billion last year, according to UKIE's latest Consumer Market Assessment report, an increase of 4.4% from the revised 2022 figure of £7.49 billion, according to Gamesindustry.biz Marie Dealesandri NTES;GME;NTDOY; said.EA;Chehi;UBSFY-UK-games-market-rose–yearoveryear-in–GIbiz-reports&utm_source=https://thefly.com/news.php%3fsymbol=NTES&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=referral_traffic” target=”_blank”>Report. 2023 Software sales in the UK rose 4.1% year-on-year to £5.18 billion, while hardware sales rose 2.1% to £2.22 billion, the authors noted.
Other featured stories:
- Microsoft is previewing a new Xbox Cloud Gaming interface, reports the Verge (read more)
- Blizzard Entertainment and NetEase (NTES) renew publishing agreement (read more)
- Electronic Arts (EA) will increase the price of its EA Play subscription service, Gamesindustry.biz reports (read more)
- According to the Verge, Sony is preparing to release a more powerful version of the PlayStation 5 (read more)
- According to Gamesindustry.biz, Final Fantasy VII: A Realm was the best-selling game in Japan in March (read more)
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