Metal Gear Solid 4 Helps Drive Strong Konami Growth

Metal Gear Solid 4 helped push Konami to strong gains over the last nine months. Despite a strong yen and a soft global economy, the Japanese company saw net revenues of ¥234,011 million ($2.6 billion) -- five percent up on the previous year. Konami's overall profits were ¥17,826 million ($198.8 million), up nearly 17.3 percent year over year. Specifically, the company's video game business saw greater net revenues than any other Konami division, up 10.6 percent to ¥148.7 billion ($1.6 billion) -- well more than half the company's total. Konami sold 22.35 million units of software over the nine months, and in addition to largest-scale growth driver MGS4, Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer 2009 also played a notable role. Notably, half of the publisher's sales occurred on PlayStation platforms -- 32 percent on PlayStation 3 and 18 percent on PlayStation 2. In the same period of the previous year, PS3 software only accounted for 9 percent of the publisher's unit sales, demonstrative of MGS4's muscle. "The Metal Gear series is exhibiting its strength as a brand, steadily increasing the number sold year-to-date to more than 4.5 million units," said Konami, adding that Metal Gear Online is now up to 1 million accounts worldwide in the first four months since its June 2008 launch.