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Top ten biggest video games companies by revenue

Handel

Member
Tencent so far have seemed pretty hands off with their gaming acquisitions but they're bad news if that changes.


Damn. Sony is absolutely crushing the competition. Now they should use some of that $$$ and buy more studios to continue this domination.

I'm surprised take two and epic are so low though.
You do realize there's a difference between revenue and profit right?
 

Bo_Hazem

Banned
Incredibly impressive from Nintendo. Half the revenue but double the profit compared to Sony.

gif.gif

It probably costs to make all those Nintendo games less than what it costs to make a single AAA game. They're enjoying their silent fans that pay for recycled games from Wii U and before at full price with barely any enhancements. I wonder what is Xbox profit though, most probably in minus.
 
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The_Mike

I cry about SonyGaf from my chair in Redmond, WA
The video game industry as a whole marked yet another sales record last year, being now worth over 130 billion U.S. dollars. 2021’s Top 10 biggest video game brands are also largely the same as in the previous years. The following lists the Top 10 biggest video game companies 2021 in the world by the achieved gaming revenue last year.



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The only thing this list shows is that gamers should be worried about Tencent being number two on that list.
 
It probably costs to make all those Nintendo games less than what it costs to make a single AAA game. They're enjoying their silent fans that pay for recycled games from Wii U and before at full price with barely any enhancements. I wonder what is Xbox profit though, most probably in minus.
It's also way more profitable being a first party machine compared to being a CoD/sports game machine.
 
All the other companies seem to be accurate from what I see. I didn't look into Tencent till now but there could be various things going on but I need time to look into it.
These seem to be based on fiscal years and not calendar years, so I am not sure if they are comparing the same time periods. For Example, MSFT number seems to be FY 2020 which actually ended in June of 2020, Sony is still in the middle of their 2020 FY.

That being said, I don't think it would change the overall picture that much though...Sony and Tencent in either 1 or 2...a large gap...then Microsoft and Nintendo in 3 or 4.
 
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AJUMP23

Member
It probably costs to make all those Nintendo games less than what it costs to make a single AAA game. They're enjoying their silent fans that pay for recycled games from Wii U and before at full price with barely any enhancements. I wonder what is Xbox profit though, most probably in minus.
It is also the best business model. They put in an investment into the WiiU and they have found a way to recoup it in spades with the switch. If you can invest in something 10 years ago and still generate sales from it, then you do it as a company. It is why their stock price has grown substantially during the Switch era.
 
You do realize there's a difference between revenue and profit right?
Again: profit only matters for shareholders. Money that a company reinvests in its business (in terms of R&D, acquisitions, investments, hiring more staff, etc) doesn't show up as profit. It's a totally worthless metric for assessing the overall performance of a games company from the perspective of a gamer.
 

NahaNago

Member
Sony will have some 3rd party exclusives to fill in the gaps while 1st party exclusives are getting worked on just like this past generation

The Order 1886
Until Dawn
Death Stranding
Judgment
Bloodborne
Street Fighter V
Persona 5
The order 1886 studio is now facebook?
until dawn studio is making a multiplatform game suppose to release this year
death stranding released in 2019 so the next game won't release until 2023 minimum
judgement the last game just released worldwide in nov. 2020
Bloodborne studio is still working on elden ring
Street fighter VI is a possibility but Capcom went hard on pushing their games on to every platform later last gen. Evo backroom dealings might make it exclusive.
Persona 5 after the success of porting it to pc . I doubt the next game is going to be exclusive.

I'm not saying they won't get third party exclusives cause we did get Returnal and Demon Souls remake it's just it won't be the same this time around for this gen.
 
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rodrigolfp

Haptic Gamepads 4 Life
While true....that would knock some down a few spots on this list.

Also.....I thought Sony, Playstation division was on its way out of business? Ya know, they way some ppl tell it their days are numbered.
People said that in the PS3 gen when they had billions in deficit.
 
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Again: profit only matters for shareholders. Money that a company reinvests in its business (in terms of R&D, acquisitions, investments, hiring more staff, etc) doesn't show up as profit. It's a totally worthless metric for assessing the overall performance of a games company from the perspective of a gamer.

Revenue isn’t a good metric for that either. You need to focus more on operating cash flow, gross margins, CAPEX, and R&D expenses. You can have high revenues but low margins or even a margin loss. There is a reason why companies also discuss their margins in MD&A. I will agree that net income is not very informative, especially when you may have tons of tax breaks and extraordinary gains/losses. Really, you need to look at multiple numbers to understand the health of a business. Reductionist thinking like revenue and profit are all that matters is ignorant. Management sure isn’t looking at it that way.

Edit: One other metric that is often looked at by companies, banks, and analysts is EBITDA. I’d be remiss not to mention that it is a significant metric for judging a company’s financial health.
 
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zedinen

Member
Profits, especially when its comes to R&D-heavy firms like Sony, are distorted by GAAP, console cycles and now the global pandemic.

PS has generated $14 bn (free cash flow) since 2013, saved a junk corporation, according to Moody's credit rating, and transformed Sony into Japan's 3rd most valuable company, powerful enough to acquire

- SFH for $3.7 bn
- EMI for $2.3 bn
- Crunchyroll for $1.2 bn
- invest $400 ml in Bilibili, etc.

PS has been Sony's long-term cash cow since FY2010 (PS3 Slim) to the point that the biggest threat to PS dynasty is Sony Group Corp.

Sony was the Apple of its day: the temptation to milk PS and rebuild Sony's empire is too big.

Stop blaming Ryan and pay attention to the big boss aka Kenichiro Yoshida.
 
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Hobbygaming

has been asked to post in 'Grounded' mode.
The order 1886 studio is now facebook?
until dawn studio is making a multiplatform game suppose to release this year
death stranding released in 2019 so the next game won't release until 2023 minimum
judgement the last game just released worldwide in nov. 2020
Bloodborne studio is still working on elden ring
Street fighter VI is a possibility but Capcom went hard on pushing their games on to every platform later last gen. Evo backroom dealings might make it exclusive.
Persona 5 after the success of porting it to pc . I doubt the next game is going to be exclusive.

I'm not saying they won't get third party exclusives cause we did get Returnal and Demon Souls remake it's just it won't be the same this time around for this gen.
The deals for exclusives could come from anywhere. In fact, We're already seeing it with timed stuff like

Forspoken
Final Fantasy XVI
Kena
Ghost Wire Tokyo
Oddworld
Guilty Gear Strive (might not come to Xbox ever like the last few entries)

Did PS gamers not enjoy Judgment in 2018 because it just released on other consoles last November? Lol like I said Sony will have other games to fill in the gaps to give their 1st party time to do their thing

Supermassive Games (Until Dawn) have multiple PS5 exclusives in development btw
 
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NahaNago

Member
The deals for exclusives could come from anywhere. In fact, We're already seeing it with timed stuff like

Forspoken
Final Fantasy XVI
Kena
Ghost Wire Tokyo
Oddworld
Guilty Gear Strive (might not come to Xbox ever like the last few entries)

Did PS gamers not enjoy Judgment in 2018 because it just released on other consoles last November? Lol like I said Sony will have other games to fill in the gaps to give their 1st party time to do their thing

Supermassive Games (Until Dawn) have multiple PS5 exclusives in development btw
I agree that they could come from anywhere it's just the likely ones are unlikely this time around. Forspoken and ff16 are realisticly just timed exclusives. Kena is releasing this year and ghost wire tokyo will go everywhere after the exclusivity period. No idea on oddworld but Guilty Gear Strive I'm sure will spread it's wings to other platforms this gen. The whole did ps gamers not enjoy Judgment comment is the same reasoning to get rid of all exclusives though. Short term exclusivity seems to be Sony's new stance which I can understand to an extent since most of a games money comes from the initial sales for big budget games.
 

KungFucius

King Snowflake
Interested to see a profit list instead. I can make a shitton of revenue, but if I spend a ton of money in doing so the end result isn't considered successful. Trying to figure out why certain decisions are being made by looking at the revenue only seems kind of futile.
Why "instead" as opposed to "in addition to"? Revenue is how much money consumers are throwing at them and that is pretty important. How well they are at turning that into profit is interesting too, but that is going to skew more towards mobile shitware.
 
I wonder if Sony looks at the mobile gaming revenues and considers a significant acquisition in that space. It wouldn’t really have an impact on their console market share and would bring in boatloads of cash.
 

Lanrutcon

Member
Why "instead" as opposed to "in addition to"? Revenue is how much money consumers are throwing at them and that is pretty important. How well they are at turning that into profit is interesting too, but that is going to skew more towards mobile shitware.

Profit is the more important of the two numbers in my opinion, but sure: both are very interesting. "How it skews" is irrelevant. Mobile games are stupidly efficient at making money, and making money is how success is measured in business. The fact that the games are shit is kind of irrelevant to the equation.
 
It's crazy how Microsoft, who views Xbox as an ancillary to its Windows and Cloud businesses, is near the top of these standings when the rest are companies that prop their entire existence on game revenue.
 
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johntown

Banned
I wonder what the list would look like without F2P games or games where sole money maker scheme is either loot boxes or cosmetic digital items.

That would eliminate EA, Tencent and Epic.

I didn't really think Sony made that much for games their develop either.
 

Fat Frog

I advertised for Google Stadia
Pretty sure that SEGA have been doing good in recent years.
Yeah but i didn't realize it was enough to beat Bandai Namco, Square Enix, Ubisoft. Plus, their potential sales are even bigger with Atlus testing multiplatforms(just the beginning) BC sales on Xbox/PC doing pretty well without additional effort(Orta topping the japanese charts almost 20 years later is quite impressive), the big TCA FPS incoming... they just need to sell the pachiko branch and they'll make profits for the next 50 years. (Indies, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Paramount, they all pay Sega fees to produce games or making movies...)
 

cireza

Banned
Yeah but i didn't realize it was enough to beat Bandai Namco, Square Enix, Ubisoft. Plus, their potential sales are even bigger with Atlus testing multiplatforms(just the beginning) BC sales on Xbox/PC doing pretty well without additional effort(Orta topping the japanese charts almost 20 years later is quite impressive), the big TCA FPS incoming... they just need to sell the pachiko branch and they'll make profits for the next 50 years. (Indies, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Paramount, they all pay Sega fees to produce games or making movies...)
I think all their projects have been very reasonable from a "profitable" perspective. Everything is well measured, even though it does translate in games that don't really feel ambitious enough for fans like us. Hopefully, they will release a couple big titles this year. It would be great, because I am craving for something akin to Valkyria Chronicles 4 and a new 3D Sonic game.
 
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Stuart360

Member
Valve / Steam?
Its really hard to find Steam revenue, probably because they are a private company.
I had a search and the most up to date stats had Steam revenue at 4.3bil in 2017, NOT including dlc, mtx, and apps.

As we have had yearly released Steam stats by Valve themselves (not revenue though), we know that Steam grows considerably every year (inclduing games sales gong up 30% just from 2019-2020), so i think its fair to say that Steam revenue has at least doubled from 2017, if not nearing on triple the revenue. Then when you add in the money from dlc, mtx, and apps, you are probably talking $20bil revenue in 2020, if not considerably more.
 

v_iHuGi

Banned
Profits, especially when its comes to R&D-heavy firms like Sony, are distorted by GAAP, console cycles and now the global pandemic.

PS has generated $14 bn (free cash flow) since 2013, saved a junk corporation, according to Moody's credit rating, and transformed Sony into Japan's 3rd most valuable company, powerful enough to acquire

- SFH for $3.7 bn
- EMI for $2.3 bn
- Crunchyroll for $1.2 bn
- invest $400 ml in Bilibili, etc.

PS has been Sony's long-term cash cow since FY2010 (PS3 Slim) to the point that the biggest threat to PS dynasty is Sony Group Corp.

Sony was the Apple of its day: the temptation to milk PS and rebuild Sony's empire is too big.

Stop blaming Ryan and pay attention to the big boss aka Kenichiro Yoshida.

Sony comeback is 1 for history, I've lost 20€ in a bet I made that they would go bank rupt back in 2009.
 

Handel

Member
Again: profit only matters for shareholders. Money that a company reinvests in its business (in terms of R&D, acquisitions, investments, hiring more staff, etc) doesn't show up as profit. It's a totally worthless metric for assessing the overall performance of a games company from the perspective of a gamer.
Only an insane person would think profit is irrelevant, even from a "gamer perspective". If a company is highly profitable they can afford to spend more on business ventures, pay it's employees better wages/reduce layoffs, fund niche games to broaden their portfolio, etc. Revenue as a metric is also worthless given your argument, as it doesn't measure reinvestment. What worth is revenue as a metric from a "gamer perspective"?
 

chinoXL

Member
Sony comeback is 1 for history, I've lost 20€ in a bet I made that they would go bank rupt back in 2009.
i was just talking to a co-worker about this today...crazy how they turned it around..i love to see it, i grew up loving their electronics would have sucked to see them go away
 
Only an insane person would think profit is irrelevant, even from a "gamer perspective". If a company is highly profitable they can afford to spend more on business ventures, pay it's employees better wages/reduce layoffs, fund niche games to broaden their portfolio, etc. Revenue as a metric is also worthless given your argument, as it doesn't measure reinvestment. What worth is revenue as a metric from a "gamer perspective"?
Money spent on business ventures, paying employees, and funding niche games doesn't appear as profit.

Let's say you have two companies, one that has $25 billion in revenue, spends $15 billion on R&D, and makes a profit of $2 billion, and another that has $10 billion in revenue, spends $2 billion on R&D, and makes a profit of $8 billion. Which of these companies has more available to spend on improving its business? Clearly the former.

Neither revenue nor profit gives you perfect knowledge of how much a company is spending on productive stuff, but of the two profit is easily the more worthless measure since all else being equal a company that spends less on R&D will have more profit. Companies generally use profit for stock buybacks and executive compensation, not anything productive.

In this case, we already know why Nintendo turns a high profit: it spends way less than Sony on hardware and software development. You can't turn around and say that because Nintendo has higher profits than Sony it's more capable of reinvesting in its core business because the very reason it has higher profits in the first place is that it invests less in its core business.
 

Bryank75

Banned
Sony comeback is 1 for history, I've lost 20€ in a bet I made that they would go bankrupt back in 2009.

I remember I was studying business back between 2005 and 2009 and one of our management lecturers would constantly say that Sony was going to be bought by Samsung...
 

rodrigolfp

Haptic Gamepads 4 Life
Money spent on business ventures, paying employees, and funding niche games doesn't appear as profit.

Let's say you have two companies, one that has $25 billion in revenue, spends $15 billion on R&D, and makes a profit of $2 billion, and another that has $10 billion in revenue, spends $2 billion on R&D, and makes a profit of $8 billion. Which of these companies has more available to spend on improving its business? Clearly the former.

Neither revenue nor profit gives you perfect knowledge of how much a company is spending on productive stuff, but of the two profit is easily the more worthless measure since all else being equal a company that spends less on R&D will have more profit. Companies generally use profit for stock buybacks and executive compensation, not anything productive.

In this case, we already know why Nintendo turns a high profit: it spends way less than Sony on hardware and software development. You can't turn around and say that because Nintendo has higher profits than Sony it's more capable of reinvesting in its core business because the very reason it has higher profits in the first place is that it invests less in its core business.
Not always. And no, revenue is more worthless because profits gives you info about the money that they are making. Revenue alone means nothing.
 

Fat Frog

I advertised for Google Stadia
Ps4 did good, Xbox One did bad.
Pretty much.

Playstation 4, 115 millions units (25 billions)

Xbox One, 50 millions units (11 millions)

Sony has just crushed Xbox's first life form:
470157943.gif


Bethesda X Microsoft could be defeated again but i doubt all Playstation owners will skip the Next Doom, Elder scroll. (many of them will either buy them on PC or try the gamepass with a Series S)

Other acquisitions are coming.

We all know the PS4 generation was a huge loss for Microsoft but the current generation could be quite another story (300 dollars console for students, load of deals with Japanese publishers for otakus and Asia, more and more huge BC library, acquisition of powerful publishers, studios. Turning a single playstation owner is a mini victory for the future with the gamepass and BC's incredible value: Even if xbone's japanese portfolio was not fantastic, if you add OG Xbox(Otogi, Orta) , 360(Lost Odyssey, Blue Dragon, VF5) , XBLA's titles ( Guardian Heroes, Radiant Silvergun), it becomes a solid system for Japan lovers.


Sorry, Sony fans, i'm just being practical.
Taking a picture when Sony just crushed the Xbone is smart but to be honest Microsoft is a sleeping MONSTER.
They have as much money as amazon, more game studios than Sony, and a fantastic BC policy to give a serious reason to keep the customers loyal.
(many PS2 classics are stuck on PS2/PS3)
 
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Bryank75

Banned
Pretty much.

Playstation 4, 115 millions units (25 billions)

Xbox One, 50 millions units (11 millions)

Sony has just crushed Xbox's first life form:
470157943.gif


Bethesda X Microsoft could be defeated again but i doubt all Playstation owners will skip the Next Doom, Elder scroll. (many of them will either buy them on PC or try the gamepass with a Series S)

Other acquisitions are coming.

We all know the PS4 generation was a huge loss for Microsoft but the current generation could be quite another story (300 dollars console for students, load of deals with Japanese publishers for otakus and Asia, more and more huge BC library, acquisition of powerful publishers, studios. Turning a single playstation owner is a mini victory for the future with the gamepass and BC's incredible value: Even if xbone's japanese portfolio was not fantastic, if you add OG Xbox(Otogi, Orta) , 360(Lost Odyssey, Blue Dragon, VF5) , XBLA's titles ( Guardian Heroes, Radiant Silvergun), it becomes a solid system for Japan lovers.


Sorry, Sony fans, i'm just being practical.
Taking a picture when Sony just crushed the Xbone is smart but to be honest Microsoft is a sleeping MONSTER.
They have as much money as amazon, more game studios than Sony, and a fantastic BC policy to give a serious reason to keep the customers loyal.
(many PS2 classics are stuck on PS2/PS3)
And what if they sell less consoles than last gen and the 'play anywhere' stuff just doesn't take off?

What then?

What if all the billions and billions spent result in no ground taken, not a single percentage point of market share gained? What will they do then?
 

Stuart360

Member
And what if they sell less consoles than last gen and the 'play anywhere' stuff just doesn't take off?

What then?

What if all the billions and billions spent result in no ground taken, not a single percentage point of market share gained? What will they do then?
Why would they sell less than last gen though?.
The XB1 was less powerful than PS4,,was $100 more than PS4, had Kinect that no one wanted,, had average first party support, tons of negativity throughout the generation, especially at the start.
This gen there is a lot of positivity around Xbox, they have 2 consoles, one of which is considerably cheaper and will be desirable for parents and the more casual gamers, 27 studios now making first party games, Gamepass that is growing by millions every quarter.

I honestly dont get the thinking that they could do worse this gen. I mean i'm certain PS5 will still 'win' this gen, but i'll be very surprised if we finish this gen and Xbox hasnt hit 60-70mil consoles, possibly 80mil.
 
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Bryank75

Banned
Why would they sell less than last gen though?.
The XB1 was less powerful than PS4, had average first party support, tons of negativity throughout the generation, especially at the start.
This gen there is a lot of positivity around Xbox, they have 2 consoles, one of which is considerably cheaper and will be desirable for parents and the more casual gamers, 27 studios now making first party games, Gamepass that is growing by millions every quarter.

I honestly dont get the thinking that they could do worse this gen. I mean i'm certain PS5 will still 'win' this gen, but i'll be very surprised if we finish this gen and Xbox hasnt hit 60-70mil consoles, possibly 80mil.
There's a lot of positivity online among forum goers and Xbox enthusiasts.

I have yet to see the Xbox audience expand. I mean, it is possible and I might not be seeing it due to my bias...

I am just asking, what happens if they don't get anywhere after all this investment? Where do they go from there?
 

Stuart360

Member
There's a lot of positivity online among forum goers and Xbox enthusiasts.

I have yet to see the Xbox audience expand. I mean, it is possible and I might not be seeing it due to my bias...

I am just asking, what happens if they don't get anywhere after all this investment? Where do they go from there?
Well i suppose it would go on their revenue. If XSX/XSS sell a bit behind XB1, but they are still pulling in $11bil a year, i doubt they will lose sleep over it.
Besides i just cant see XSX/XSS doing worse. I mean look at everything that was against XB1, right from the start, yet it STILL managed to sell $50mil consoles. Its almost the opposite situation this gen.
 

Bryank75

Banned
Well i suppose it would go on their revenue. If XSX/XSS sell a bit behind XB1, but they are still pulling in $11bil a year, i doubt they will lose sleep over it.
Besides i just cant see XSX/XSS doing worse. I mean look at everything that was against XB1, right from the start, yet it STILL managed to sell $50mil consoles. Its almost the opposite situation this gen.

You're probably right. I can see some people picking up and Xbox for what they are missing....

If Jim Ryan does nothing, I can certainly see people eventually catching on and switching or going to PC.
 

Stuart360

Member
You're probably right. I can see some people picking up and Xbox for what they are missing....

If Jim Ryan does nothing, I can certainly see people eventually catching on and switching or going to PC.
I dont think you will get loads of poeple switching from PS5 to Xbox, but you will probably get some buying both. Which is the right thing to do really with all the first party games Xbox will have this gen.
There is no doubt, Playstation is still more popular worldwide, and will 100% sell more this gen
 
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