Sega Sammy on Thursday posted lower fiscal year sales from the previous year, citing a poor global economy, a sluggish arcade business and video game software demand that has âleveled offâ in Japan.
The company posted a net loss of ¥22.88 billion ($239.26 million), narrower than the previous year's loss of ¥52.47 billion ($548.69 million).
But the company still managed to pull off operating profit of Â¥8.36 billion ($87.45 million) for the year ended March 31, an improvement from the prior yearâs operating loss of Â¥5.83 billion ($60.97 million). Sales were Â¥429.19 billion ($4.49 billion), down 6.5 percent year-on-year.
Although Sega said that software sales in Japan have âleveled off⦠due to widespread proliferation of the current generation of game platformsâ, demand for software has remained âfirmâ in North America and Europe.
Sega cited solid year-end sales of Sonic Unleashed and Football Manager 2009, as well as continued sales of Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games. Other strong performers were Phantasy Star Portable for PSP and Ryu Ga Gotoku 3 (a.k.a. Yakuza 3). However, Sega said that other unspecified titles âperformed weakly.â
Also released near the end of Segaâs most fiscal year were the M-rated Wii titles Madworld and House of the Dead: Overkill, which both logged weak sales in the U.S. in their opening months.
