EA: more revenue through more downloads

Electronic Arts achieved revenue of $1.27 billion in the first quarter of its fiscal year ending June 30. This was mainly due to more revenue from content sold digitally, because there is more margin on it than physically sold games.

Despite the quiet first quarter of the year according to Reuters, the unexpectedly good sales within FIFA Ultimate Team on console and Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes on mobile boosted the results. In total, EA achieved quarterly revenue of $689 million, or $609 million. Of that amount, 83 percent, or $568 million, came from digital sales.

Of EA’s online games, the Battlefield franchise had the best numbers with a total of 11.5 million unique players during the first quarter. Battlefield 4 accounted for the bulk of the number of players, although it has not been announced how many.

Star Wars Battlefront was in second place with 6.6 million players. At Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes, gamers played an average of 2.5 hours a day in the first quarter. Madden NFL 16 managed to attract 20 percent more players, although EA does not say how many that is in absolute numbers. Madden NFL Mobile had 25 percent more players than a year earlier.

EA is coming up with some big titles this year, including another FIFA title just before the end of the second quarter and Battlefield 1 and Titanfall 2 during the year-end craze.