Capcom banking on Resident Evil 7 as sales and profits falter

Capcom's financial report for the nine months ending December 31 is in, and both sales and profits are down.

Across the company as a whole, net sales fell by 6.2 percent year-over-year to 53.5 billion yen ($470.5 million), while profits tumbled by 60.6 percent during the same period to 2.7 billion yen ($23.7 million).

Looking specifically at the Digital Contents division, which houses Capcom's video game operations, net sales fell by 21.2 percent to 28.4 billion yen ($249.8 million) despite the "firm" performance of Dead Rising 4, and the "steady" efforts of re-releases including Resident Evil 5 and Resident Evil 4. 

While the company seems generally pleased with those performances, it did highlight the "soft" sales of Monster Hunter Stories, a 3DS release targeted at younger audiences, as a cause for concern. 

Overall though, the Japanese publisher remains positive as we head toward the final quarter, mainly due to its belief that blockbuster releases like Resident Evil 7 and Monster Hunter XX will bring home the bacon. 

As such, the company hasn't revised its financial forecast, and still expects to see net sales of 85 billion yen ($747.6 million) and profits of 9 billion yen ($79.1 million) by the end of the fiscal year on March 31.