Publisher narrows net loss as revenues down more than 15 percent year-over-year, subscription and digital distribution sales now 11 percent of total business.
One year ago, Atari reported a full-year net loss of more than $319 million on revenues of less than $193 million. The red ink was blamed on restructuring charges, and the publisher promised to focus on releasing fewer, more profitable games. Today, the publisher posted its results for the fiscal year ended March 31, and the numbers show the publisher has improved, but fallen short of a complete turnaround.
For the full year, Atari posted revenues of €115.7 ($142.5 million), down more than 15 percent from the year before. As for why sales were down, the publisher pointed to its plan to release fewer games with a focus on more profitable titles. Of its reduced slate, Ghostbusters: The Video Game, Backyard Football 2010, Champions Online, and Star Trek Online were singled out as sales leaders. The latter two titles also helped drive expansion in Atari's online revenue, which consists of subscription fees and digital distribution sales.
In the previous fiscal year, online revenues only accounted for 2 percent of Atari's cash flow, but the publisher's first two massively multiplayer offerings from its 2008 acquisition Cryptic Studios pushed that number to 11 percent of total sales.
Unfortunately, Atari's plan couldn't produce a profitable year, as the publisher posted a 12-month net loss of €19.4 million ($23.9 million). The bulk of the work on the publisher's turnaround may be a thing of the past, as Atari actually posted a slim net profit of €3.8 million ($4.7 million) for the second half of its fiscal year.
Atari expects its bottom line improvement to continue in the coming year due to a number of factors, specifically the fall launch of Test Drive Unlimited 2, next spring's The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, and this year's Backyard Sports: Sandlot Sluggers and Backyard Football. The publisher also is banking on strong performances from Xbox Live, PlayStation Network, and PC downloadable games based on vintage Atari brands, as well as new casual and social online efforts.
Brendan Sinclair has been a games journalist since 1999. His tastes are eclectic, though he has a definite affinity for games with arcade roots. He's Canadian, but has also been at home in Atlanta, Austin, Chicago, and San Francisco.
@GeneralArrow Thanks for the compliment, actually I'm an ogre. My Gamertag I mean, Green Oni, I'm an ogre of green. Seriously though I stand by what I say, Ghostbusters is the best game that's come out of Atari in years be it published games or developed by Atari......
Also all game publishing companies now have just started to put in the numbers for games sold online & downloaded over the internet trough IE steam and other download sites, so in a whole this year should be good for numbers for PC if there taking net sales into account. But at the same game companies have slashed the amount of games being made so the way it look they just might brake even.
as mainly a pc gamer...i could care less if they bring games that were exclusive on pc to the console. only catch is, i don't want them watering down the game. as long as the control sceme works well, the game isn't dumbed down for the console crowd, and i can adjust my graphics the way i want, go ahead and put it on the consoles. if that increases revenues and helps companies stay afloat so they can make more games, i'm cool with that.
The funny thing about businesses is that they are still making money. They say they were down 11% from the previous year. That's just 11% less profit from the previous year. They made money, just not as much. All retail companies go by this very same model. The wording makes it sound like the company is in big trouble, but the only true way to tell how bad off Atari is would be to compare their gross income to operating costs. Those numbers are curiously absent from this report. Thus ends my blurb of useless info!
Why make us pay to play the game after we pay 50 or 60 dollars. All the other games I have don't charge me to play them after I buy them.
Will buy Star Trek Online soon and Witcher 2 when it comes. Played 1st Witcher a lot and i think something like 45% of the storyline. I hope i have my saved files saved in somewhere and to install it again and to finish it before 2nd one comes. Good luck to Atari.
@ impost3r no need to troll, I have been gaming for 22 years, people want these kinds of games without the hassles that often come with pc releases.
@green_dominator Your a troll, before you go bashing those games you should know that only Star Trek Online and BackYard Sports is under Atari. Heroes Online is NCsoft. Also, I loved the backyard sports titles as a kid.
@mekhdakart They'd have to water down the difficultly and take out all the sexing or your parents would complain.
Bring Witcher 2 to consoles, I think it has good potential for strong sales. Just look at Oblivion, as long as the game is function people want to play this style of game
many solutions that can be offered, for example, with co-operation / partner programs like EA lately!! :| where developers were given the freedom to choose and have the intellectual property (IP) rights over them, something like that could be attract large developers, which will surely be beneficial for Atari. ;)
With games like Backyard sports titles, Star Trek Online and Heroes Online it's no wonder Atari fails...... I'm surprised really that Activision hasn't tried buying these guys I mean their games are kinda up Activision's alley......
@fps_d0minat0r i totally agree with you. Although i hope they do get back on track. It would be a shame if this once shining star stopped shining all together.
I hope the company can get throught this difficult time and keep working on good games for us :)
This is good old Infogrames under Atari name. I can't believe that so few know this... @diesil, Test Drive Unlimited 2 looks very promising too (if it will feature Ferrari ofc) and not too long to wait for its release.
They just don't make good games. In fact I can't tell you any thing they made in the last year. They could of had something with the Driver series. But they had to go & make Driver 3 which sucked & So maybe trying to bring it back they sold the game to Ubisoft. They just need to sell the company to Nintendo or somebody how actually cares
Make games that work...patch ghostbusters for the 360 and improve on the PS3 patch as it is absolutely impossible to earn 1000G. Broken game. Atari and the developer Terminal Reality are flat out ignoring all requests....
heres a hint make better games the witcher is the only promising title coming out soon and its sadly not gonna sell even tho its gonna b a great game like the 1st
champions online and star trek online really failed to be worth playing for the average person. no wonder they are not making money. I like Atari for its long history so I hope it doesn't continue to fail or we may never see it again.
too be honest I'm not suprised,,,they havent really made many good games recently, though I'm amazed star trek online is one of the leading sellers,,,its junk...
So let me get this straight: sales went down and they credit that to their business plan? I can't be reading that right LOL.
Atari stopped being relevant in 1984, after Warner broke them apart and sold them piece by piece.
As an old Atri owner, it pains me to see them in trouble, but what can i say, they haven't been pushing any games worth mentioning lately. if they'll keep up publishing bad games or half games like star-track on line their future will be bleak.
As an old Atri owner, it pains me to see them in trouble, but what can i say, they haven't been pushing any games worth mentioning lately. if they'll keep up publishing bad games of half games like star-track on line their future will be blike
poor guys now they have to lower theyr payment from 20.000? to 15.000? i wonder how they will survive
The fact that Champions and Star Trek are listed as some of their top sellers is bad, bad news alone...
They're focusing on fewer more high quality games? Well they've got the fewer part down. Why are they still making backyard games while they're in the red? Who still buys those games?
The Atari name is cursed. Every time someone buys it, they end up getting shut down at some point.
What a way to drop so much from failure. They should have worked harder on their games ortherwise they could have avoided this much damage.
Atari is one the worst publishers... i dont even remember a good game by Atari. . .they deserve it :D
They should be undergoing a rapid rebranding process, and rename the company to RETARI. LOL!
@Mar04: Your argument is invalid. Those licenses will go to another publisher if Atari fails. And it might be better.
Maxwell and Kevin have a fireside chat about the Witcher 2 coming to the Xbox 360.
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