The global video game publisher has had an immensely successful start to the current year. In the 1st quarter of 2020, the publishing Group generated consolidated revenues of PLN 5.6 million (40% YoY), which has been the best sales results since the 2nd quarter of 2018. The company not only closed off the projects that were not promising but also optimized the HOPA game portfolio, which resulted in double sales of this segment’s titles (April and May 2020). Thus, Artifex Mundi makes great use of the Group’s multi-month reorganization process.
The driving force of Artifex Mundi’s sales this year is the HOPA segment, which in the 1st quarter of 2020 generated PLN 4.85 million in total (PLN 3.5 million in the 1st quarter of 2019). In the period analyzed, half of the 10 bestselling games from the portfolio were HOPA games, which in the last three quarters were released on console platforms, which had a substantial impact on their total sales.
A real increase in the sales of HOPA games was recorded in April in May of the current year.
In the 1st quarter of the current year, the game that generated the highest revenues from the Group’s portfolio was Bladebound. The game is constantly being developed. At the start of 2020, the developer introduced its largest content update: the Power System, which changed the fundamentals of the metagame in Bladebound, including a character level-up system, resource management system, and gameplay balance. It also added a new interface which was in compliance with the current trends in Bladebound‘s genre.
At the same time, the Group launched concept works on a new RPG project in the F2P segment with the use of experience gained and technology adopted during the development of Bladebound. While undertaking this strategic activity, the Group also submitted two GameINN applications.
Unsolved to change game rules?
In the 1st quarter, The Group continued testing new commercialization ways of the HOPA portfolio, also with the use of models that go beyond the classic premium sales, by releasing an application called Unsolved: Mystery Adventure Detective Games, which combines some of the games available in the Group’s portfolio and enables players to access them as part of a model similar to free-to-play, with partially paid content.
The profits from the commercialization of Unsolved constitute a sound basis for the further growth of this form of monetization of the Artifex Mundi Group’s game portfolio in the next quarters of 2020.
See Artifex Mundi’s investor presentation (IQ2020) [in polish]
