Activision has just announced their financial results for Q4 2017 and for the entire year. Investors will be pleased that the company has brought in record amounts of revenues last year. In fact, total net revenues were $7.02 billion using GAAP numbers.
However, the company made over $4 billion from microtransactions last year which is more than half of total revenues in 2017. Put simply, Activision Blizzard made more money from selling loot crates and other types of microtransactions than they did by actually selling video games. “Activision Blizzard delivered a fourth-quarter record of over $1 billion of in-game net bookings, and an annual record of over $4 billion of in-game net bookings,” the company noted in their financial report.
To be fair, about $2 billion of the revenue from microtransactions came from King, maker of popular games on Facebook and mobile devices such as Candy Crush Saga and Shuffle Cats. King was acquired by Activision Blizzard in 2016.
The company boasts over 385 million Monthly Active Users across all platforms.
It just goes to show that despite the backlash faced by rival Electronic Arts over loot boxes in Star Wars Battlefront II, microtransactions are incredibly lucrative for video game publishers.
