Square's Wada Ordered to Resign by Voice from Heaven
Huge losses made by the company also a bit of a clue
Resign!
Square Enix lost its CEO, Yoichi Wada, following a voice from God him (or her) self ordering his resignation. Well, that an bloody huge financial losses incurred by trying to make the Western market work.
As we reported, The executive made his resignation following the company's latest financial report, in which it revised its forecast for the year and warned that it was expecting to suffer an 'extraordinary loss'." And those loses, according to Wada this week, were a great deal to do with the fact that:
"Financial year 2013 was our first big attempt to release hallmark western titles, such as Hitman and Tomb Raider, without releasing a blockbuster title in Japan," that didn't work he told analysts shortly before resigning, "We put considerable amount of effort in polishing and perfecting the game content for these titles, receiving extremely high Metacritic scores. However, we were very disappointed to see that the high scores did not translate to actual sales performance."
As we pointed out at the time, "look at the document's charts reveals that Square Enix's Digital Entertainment division is expecting an increase in net sales - 87 billion yen compared to 71.9 billion yen in 2012 - which correlates with the relative chart successes of Hitman Absolution, Tomb Raider and Sleeping Dogs.
It's just not expecting to make any money from any of those sales - revised projections for the Digital Entertainment division's operating income has plummeted to a mere 1 billion yen (from 12.6 billion yen in 2012). The publisher also pointed to a lack of sales momentum in North America, with an "ineffective sales force" resulting in two thirds of the number of units sold in Europe."
For his part, Mr Wada is reported by GamesIndustry as saying that "the huge loss the company incurred in the last financial year was like a voice from the heavens ordering his resignation." By "God" we assume he meant "board of directors".
As we reported, The executive made his resignation following the company's latest financial report, in which it revised its forecast for the year and warned that it was expecting to suffer an 'extraordinary loss'." And those loses, according to Wada this week, were a great deal to do with the fact that:
"Financial year 2013 was our first big attempt to release hallmark western titles, such as Hitman and Tomb Raider, without releasing a blockbuster title in Japan," that didn't work he told analysts shortly before resigning, "We put considerable amount of effort in polishing and perfecting the game content for these titles, receiving extremely high Metacritic scores. However, we were very disappointed to see that the high scores did not translate to actual sales performance."
As we pointed out at the time, "look at the document's charts reveals that Square Enix's Digital Entertainment division is expecting an increase in net sales - 87 billion yen compared to 71.9 billion yen in 2012 - which correlates with the relative chart successes of Hitman Absolution, Tomb Raider and Sleeping Dogs.
It's just not expecting to make any money from any of those sales - revised projections for the Digital Entertainment division's operating income has plummeted to a mere 1 billion yen (from 12.6 billion yen in 2012). The publisher also pointed to a lack of sales momentum in North America, with an "ineffective sales force" resulting in two thirds of the number of units sold in Europe."
For his part, Mr Wada is reported by GamesIndustry as saying that "the huge loss the company incurred in the last financial year was like a voice from the heavens ordering his resignation." By "God" we assume he meant "board of directors".
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