The primary driver of this surge came from the company’s games. However, it’s worth noting that Pearl Abyss has started to aggregate the revenues of Black Desert and EVE Online, instead of providing separate data, which makes it challenging to understand the performance of each game. This tactic by PA is new and a contrast to the report from three months ago, where the revenues of both games were clearly differentiated, providing valuable insight into the varying playerbases and their dynamics.
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The lack of clear separation between the revenues of EVE Online and Black Desert wasn’t well-received by everyone—including some of the investor representatives who voiced their concerns during the call. One of them even asked for a segregation of the two games.
The PA executives responded by stating that, “The breakdown is quite similar to our last presentation numbers,” but left it at that.
This obfuscation is concerning, considering BDO’s weak and EVE’s flat Q3 numbers. It’s also perplexing in light of the 20% increase in game-specific revenues. Unless we’re to assume that all these gains came from EVE Galaxy Conquest—which is highly unlikely—since this was the only other game launched by the company in this period apart from Black Desert for the Chinese market.
Budding blogger Nosy Gamer takes this argument a step further by suggesting that Pearl Abyss is attempting to hide the unsatisfactory performance of the Chinese version of the game.
Despite this, Pearl Abyss confirms its intention to maintain BDO for at least a further decade, with a focus on delivering “consistent content” based on player feedback. Moreover, we still anticipate the launch of Crimson Desert—if it still retains any multiplayer features—by year-end.
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Message for future researchers
Their call is the first thing to be posted, and the pdf presentation can be accessed from the call page even before it is listed in the IR list.
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