Namco Bandai Stems Losses In First Quarter

In a climate of exchange rate challenges and Western market hurdles for Japanese publishers, Namco Bandai's video game segment narrowed its losses year over year by millions of dollars over the course of its first fiscal quarter. As a company overall (Namco Bandai is also comprised of toy and arcade businesses), the company cut its losses by almost half, from 2.8 billion yen ($32.9 million) to 1.6 billion yen ($18.7 million) year over year. The game segment's sales were up overall to 32.9 billion yen ($383.36 million) from 20.2 billion yen ($234.3 million), but software sales slipped slightly to 3.1 million units sold worldwide across its portfolio versus 3.4 million last year. In its presentation materials to investors, Namco Bandai said its small and mid-level titles "struggled", and that with the exception of Tekken 6, worldwide sales were poor. The title sold 1.07 million units on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 worldwide over the first quarter; by contrast, DS title Taiko Drum Master and Ben 10: Alien Force sold just 170,000 and 110,000 units, respectively. Like many Japanese publishers in the present environment, Namco Bandai says it will look to increasing global marketshare and a diverse range of platforms incorporating mobile and digital to increase its agility and improve its performance. Namco Bandai specifically notes it aims for a more focused console product mix, maximizing franchises like Tekken and its Dragon Ball games with the introduction of new IP like God Eater -- the latter sold 600,000 units within 50 days of launch on the PSP in Japan. Namco Bandai says it plans to globalize the game and "explore worldwide as a new franchise"; it's announced that through its relationship with D3Publisher, the game will be coming to the West as God Eater: Burst.