Today Activision announced its financial results for the second quarter of the calendar year 2020, related to the period between April 1 and June 30.
The publisher released a press release including a handy table summarizing its results, which you can see below.
Incidentally, said results are defined as “record” by the company, having beat previous expectations.
On top of that, the publisher has increased its prediction for the full fiscal year regarding net revenues, net bookings, and earnings per share.
The press release also included the traditional comment by Activision Blizzard Chief Executive Officer Bobby Kotick.
“Our mission to connect and engage the world through epic entertainment has never been more meaningful
Our 400 million players continue to experience fun, joy and accomplishment through our games. Our record engagement resulted in greater revenue and earnings per share than previously forecast.
While economic uncertainty could have an impact on our near-term results, the initiatives that drove our growth for the first half of the year should also provide the foundation for long-term growth.”
We also get a list of highlights underlining the performance of the publisher’s games and financial situation.
Strikingly, the battle royale game Call of Duty: Warzone has passed 75 million players.
- Activision had 125 million MAUs in the second quarter.
- Call of Duty: Warzone has reached over 75 million players to date. In the first full quarter since Warzone launched, hours played in the Modern Warfare universe increased eight-fold year-over-year, driven by both existing and new players.
- Modern Warfare added more players outside of a launch quarter to the premium Call of Duty experience than ever before, with the majority coming through upgrades from Warzone. On PC, life-to-date consumption for Modern Warfare is more than double that of the prior title.
- Call of Duty in-game net bookings more than doubled quarter-over-quarter and were around five times higher than the year-ago quarter, reaching a new quarterly record.
- Call of Duty Mobile saw strong sequential growth in engagement and player investment, benefiting from both shelter-in-place tailwinds and the team’s ongoing work to further optimize gameplay, monthly seasonal content and the in-game economy. The game climbed the top-grossing charts in US app stores, with each of the three seasons in Q2 generating more net bookings per day than the prior.
Blizzard
- Blizzard had 32 million MAUs in the second quarter.
- World of Warcraft reach and engagement once again increased sequentially, as shelter-at-home conditions further boosted the franchise’s strong trajectory. The Shadowlands expansion saw an enthusiastic response from players in its public testing, with pre-sales accelerating even further ahead of its release in the fourth quarter. Franchise engagement is the highest in a decade at this point ahead of an expansion.
- Hearthstone’s Ashes of Outland expansion launched alongside a new hero class, as the expanded team continued to accelerate the pace of innovative content in the franchise.
- Overwatch engagement grew year-over-year, including among returning players.
King
- King had 271 million MAUs in the second quarter.
- King delivered strong increases in reach and engagement amidst shelter-at-home conditions at the start of the quarter. While these tailwinds moderated in the second half of the quarter, MAUsD remained higher year-over-year, driven by the Candy CrushTM franchise.
- Candy Crush franchise MAUs grew by a double-digit percentage year-over-year. Payer conversion grew year-over-year and Candy Crush was once again the top-grossing franchise in the U.S. mobile app stores.1
- King announced it will be bringing Activision’s beloved Crash franchise to the mobile platform with Crash Bandicoot: On the Run!, an ambitious new take on the runner category with deep social and resource management elements.
- Advertising net bookings grew strongly year-over-year, accelerating through the quarter even against the backdrop of ongoing headwinds in the digital advertising sector.
If you want to compare, you can check out the results for the previous quarter, which were published in May.
About the author
