Capcom has said the ongoing games industry shift to an all-digital future won’t have much of an impact on its sales.
Sony announced a month ago that physical disc games will be discontinued for PlayStation consoles from January 2028, sparking fierce debate online.
With Xbox reportedly preparing a disc-to-digital system which lets players turn their current Xbox One and Xbox Series X discs into digital ‘purchases’, speculation is mounting that its upcoming Project Helix console may follow suit and release its games digital-only too.
While players and retailers have been expressing their concern about what this means for the future of the medium, some publishers are less concerned, at least when it comes the impact it could have on their bottom line.
In a Q&A session following its latest financial results, Capcom was asked: “What impact do you anticipate from the shrinking physical game market in the medium to long term?”
The company responded that it predicted very little impact, because the vast majority of its game sales are already digital anyway.
“Approximately 90% of our unit sales are digital,” the company’s official reply reads. “We do not anticipate a significant impact at this time.”
Capcom’s stance is perhaps understandable from a business point of view, given that it recently reported another strong financial quarter, with sales and profits up year-on-year.
According to Capcom‘s figures, net sales for Q1 in its current financial year (April 1 to June 30) were ¥70.41 billion ($430 million), up 54.7% year-on-year, while operating profit was ¥41.05 billion ($250 million), up 66.9% year-on-year.
This was mainly driven by game sales, Capcom says, with 23.81 million units sold, compared to 14.16 million units sold during the same period last year.
