DICE results reveal Battlefield sales figures, next-gen plans
Swedish developer Digital Illusions CE has announced financial results for the nine months ended September 30th, revealing a 23 per cent jump in revenues, continued strong sales of the Battlefield franchise, and plans for a next-generation console title.
Swedish developer Digital Illusions CE has announced financial results for the nine months ended September 30th, revealing a 23 per cent jump in revenues, continued strong sales of the Battlefield franchise, and plans for a next-generation console title.
Net revenues for the period came to 172.8 million SEK (19 million Euro), with pre-tax profit of 41.6 million SEK (4.6 million Euro) - up 30 per cent over last year's figures, thanks mostly to the strength of the Battlefield titles.
The Battlefield series has now sold over 4.4 million units in total, according to the statement which accompanied the financial figures, with the most recent instalment - Battlefield Vietnam - very close to breaking the million sales mark, with 990,000 units sold to date.
Digital Illusions recently bought out New York based Trauma Studios, which created the popular Desert Combat modification for Battlefield 1942, paying $500,000 for the studio according to today's announcement, which confirmed that the studio is working on a new PC title based on the Battlefield 2 engine.
The company also today revealed that it has signed a contract for a next-generation console title, targetted at Xbox 2 and PlayStation 3, which will launch in late 2006 or early 2007 and will also have PS2 and Xbox SKUs created by the firm's Canadian studio.
This is in addition to an action game which had initially been targetted at PS2 and Xbox, but has recently been upgraded to being a PS3 and Xbox 2 game aimed at a 2007 launch. Like the other next-gen title, this will be developed at the firm's Swedish studio.
Both of these titles are signed to Electronic Arts, which owns a significant stake in Digital Illusions, and today's announcement provides firm proof that the giant company is already looking ahead to the next generation - although particularly interesting is the apparent intention to keep supporting the Xbox and PS2 right through into late 2006, even building SKUs of next-generation titles for the older platforms.