Lego Harry Potter Contributes To Warner Sales Growth, Sells 2.7M

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment's June 29 release LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 helped boost parent Time Warner's revenues during fiscal Q2, the company reported Wednesday. The game has shipped 2.7 million units to date, with initial sales helping drive video game revenue in Time Warner's Filmed Entertainment segment for the quarter ended June 30. Sales in that segment were up 8 percent to $2.5 billion, driven primarily by the theatrical releases of Clash of the Titans and Sex and the City 2. Time Warner said that Traveller's Tales' 2008 release LEGO Batman has sold over 7 million units since its launch. Warner Bros. Interactive has released numerous popular LEGO-based games, including LEGO Indiana Jones and LEGO Star Wars. Over recent years, Warner Bros. Interactive had been aggressively expanding its video game business through acquisitions, including the studios Monolith (F.E.A.R.), TT Games (LEGO franchise) and most recently, NetherRealm Studios, the renamed Chicago-based Mortal Kombat house acquired from bankrupted publisher Midway Games. But that acquisition spree is slowing down, according to Warner's SVP of production and development Samantha Ryan in a recent Gamasutra interview. "We’re actually I think going to go through kind of a settling period for a little while," she said, "where we’re going to focus on getting all the stuff that we’ve just acquired well-integrated, and really focus on the games." Overall revenues at Time Warner were up 8 percent for the quarter to $6.4 billion year-over-year, across all segments. A healthier advertising market and strong box office performance drove profits up 7 percent to $562 million.