Acti-Blizz Q1: Destiny beta starts in July, Warlords of Draenor pre-sales at 1 million
By Chris Lacey
Activision Blizzard has just released the financial report for the first quarter of fiscal year 2014.
Activison Blizzard Q1 Highlights
Destiny Beta to begin in July on PlayStation platforms first.
Destiny will offer a wide variety of play modes, won’t just focus on multiplayer and pre-orders remain on a record pace.
Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls has an expansion coming.
Warlords of Draenor has already pre-sold 1 million copies.
They revealed that the beta for Destiny will start in July, and the pre-sales for Warlords of Draenor are progressing well.
For the quarter ending March 31, 2014, Activision Blizzard’s net revenues were $1.11 billion, as compared to $1.32 billion for the first quarter of 2013 – which is a decline by 35%.
For the first quarter, net revenues from digital channels made up 34% of the company’s total revenues.
“Our better-than-expected performance was driven by record digital sales in Blizzard Entertainment’s franchises, including World of Warcraft, Diablo, and Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft which has more than 10 million registered users as of its March 11 launch on Windows and Mac, in addition to Activision Publishing’s Skylanders and Call of Duty franchises,” said Activision CEO Bobby Kotick in a prepared statement.
“We have a strong product pipeline for the balance of the year, beginning with the September 9 the planned launch of Destiny, which we believe could become our next billion dollar franchise and the largest new videogame IP launch in history. Skylanders: Trap Team and Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare are expected to be released on October 5 and November 4, respectively.
“Destiny could become our next billion dollar franchise and largest new videogame IP launch in history.” – Kotick
In addition to plans for new content for Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft and the release of Diablo 3: Ultimate Evil Edition on console later this year, Blizzard Entertainment expects to launch World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor, which is already one of the fastest selling expansions in the franchise’s history based on pre-sales, in the second half of 2014.”
Blizzard Entertainment had the #1 PC title in dollars in both North America and Europe with Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls.
Warlords of Draenor will be released no later than December 20, 2014 – with Blizzard CEO Mike Morhaime stating the “back half of the year” as an estimate.
In a call to investors, publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg stated that Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare will be the most “polished” game in the series at launch than all prior games in the series.
“Visual, graphic fidelity and polish will be on a different level than previous games in the series,” said Hirshberg. “It’s the first pure next-gen developed game in the series. It has full performance capture technology, and the longer development cycle helped flesh out the story and the character’s development.”
Hirshberg also said that because of the new console transition, software sales have declined and this will continue until PS4 and Xbox One have larger install bases.
[H/T: VG247]