Capcom: "excessive outsourcing" has resulted in a "decline in ...

Capcom has once again revised down sales of its big games for the last financial year - and blamed the decision in part on "excessive outsourcing".

In a note to investors warning of a "special loss" incurred after a "strict review of games under development", Capcom revealed new expected sales for the games it released in 2013 financial year.

Its revised forecast for sales of Resident Evil 6 from 5 million to 4.9 million. Once upon a time the Japanese company had hoped to shift 7 million copies of the action shooter.

Its revised forecast for Devil May Cry is 1.15 million, down from 1.2 million, itself down from an expected 2 million.

Capcom identified three reasons for these further revisions: a "delayed response to the expanding digital contents market"; "insufficient coordination between the marketing and the game development divisions in overseas markets"; and "decline in quality due to excessive outsourcing".

The latter point - the "decline in quality due to excessive outsourcing" - is sure to make UK studio Ninja Theory wince. It made Devil May Cry at the request of Capcom, which wanted a game different in style to the previous made-in-Japan titles in the series.

Capcom's "countermeasures", as it calls them, to its lower-than-expected financial performance, include increasing DLC and shifting to internal R&D. It has also "strictly re-evaluated" work-in-progress games as part of a business restructure, which has resulted in a 7.2 billion yen (?48.1 million) special loss. In other words, it cancelled a number of unannounced titles.

All told, Capcom halved its expected profit for the 2013 financial year from ?43.4 million to ?19.4 million.

Capcom has a number of games due out in the current financial year, including some that have been outsourced.

Lost Planet 3, made by Legendary: The Box studio Spark Unlimited, is one. It was recently delayed by two months to the end of August for "business reasons".

Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-04-18-capcom-excessive-outsourcing-has-resulted-in-a-decline-in-quality

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