NCSoft's Q1 2016 Financials: Blade & Soul Soars, Guild Wars 2 Glides, WildStar Plummets

The latest financial report from NCSoft is in the wild, and there's a lot of movement, especially among its free-to-play titles with strong presences in the West -- some good, some less so.

First, the good news. As might be expected following its NA and EU launch in January, Blade & Soul excelled in the first quarter of 2016 (covering January through March), rising from 32.4 billion Korean won (bKRW) to 54.0 bKRW in sales.

Guild Wars 2 also stayed strong, following its bump during Q4 2015, when the Heart of Thorns expansion launched. Though sales dropped from 37.3 bKRW to 30.6 bKRW, that's still well above the game's pre-expansion revenues, which hovered in the 20 bKRW range.

Then there's WildStar. Its F2P launch last September helped push it out of oblivion in Q4, but it fell right back down in the hole in Q1, posting its lowest sales quarter since launch. For comparison, its 1.282 bKRW figure is less than half the reported sales (2.855 bKRW) for the last quarter we had any information regarding City of Heroes, five months before its cancellation.

Lineage continues to be the big moneymaker for NCSoft, with Lineage 2 and Aion doing steady business as well. While sales and profits in Q1 were nearly identical to those in Q4, the year-over-year numbers are up considerably. North America and Europe have more than doubled their sales since this time last year, and we'll see if the momentum from GW2 and Blade & Soul keeps that trend going forward.

You can get a copy of the full financial report on the NCSoft Investors Relations page.