Sony has raised its sales forecast for its gaming business, while announcing an official sales figure for Marvel’s Wolverine for the first time.
Sony said it had raised the sales forecast for its Game & Network Services Segment, which includes PlayStation, by 6% due to an “increase in sales of non-first-party game software titles.” Similarly, Sony raised the profit forecast for its gaming business by 6%, also citing the impact of an increase in sales of non-first-party games, but adding in an improvement in costs, and the impact of sales from network services (PlayStation Plus, etc).
Now, we all know what Sony is talking about here, or at least what it is mostly talking about: Grand Theft Auto 6. Sony’s partnership with Rockstar Games for GTA 6 has seen the PS5 at the forefront of the game’s marketing, so much so that the casual observer might not even know the game is also coming to Xbox Series X and S. Gameplay shown so far is from PS5 only, and marketing material says GTA 6 “plays best on PS5.”
Dragging profits down during the forecast for the current financial year, which ends March 31, 2027, is the delay to Sony Santa Monica’s God of War Laufey from February to May. But with GTA 6 set to become the biggest entertainment launch of all time, Sony will no doubt be comfortable with the sales shift into its next financial year.
Meanwhile, Sony said Marvel’s Wolverine sales had exceeded 2.4 million units. That’s as of November 4 — or 50 days after launch. To put that into context, fellow PS5 exclusive Ghost of Yotei sold 3.3 million units in 32 days, or just over a month after going on sale in October last year. Astro Bot had sold 1.5 million copies 58 days after going on sale in 2024.
Marvel’s Wolverine is well behind Insomniac’s previous game, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, which sold a huge 2.5 million on day one (October 2023), 5 million just 11 days after launch, and 10 million after 107 days. The big question for Wolverine will be how well it continues to sell, with the crucial holiday season coming up.
Here’s what Sony had to say about Wolverine today:
“Regarding first-party titles, cumulative sales of Marvel’s Wolverine, released in September, exceeded 2.4 million units, contributing to the improved results of the entire segment for the quarter. We leveraged our expertise building the Marvel’s Spider-Man franchise to create a differentiated action game experience for Marvel’s Wolverine. Users have praised the new title for its highly immersive action, high-quality production, and richly layered storytelling.”
PS5 sales continue to decline, as Sony had said they would at this stage of the console’s lifecycle, but the company insisted “the PS platform continues to expand and grow in a stable manner.”
And there was a brief note on its plans for the next generation of hardware, which is expected to involve a PS6 and possibly a handheld. “Looking ahead to next fiscal year, we aim to continue to enhance user engagement and further strengthen monetization through the release of strong titles and the expansion of our service. We also intend to make solid progress in preparing for the next generation platform.”
Other notable financial results include the number of monthly active users (MAUs) across the PlayStation platform increasing 7% in September compared to the same month of the previous fiscal year to 127 million accounts — that’s a record high for September. Sony said this indicates “the baseline of engagement is steadily improving.”
Sony has of course raised the price of PS5 in response to memory scarcity fueled by the AI boom, but it downplayed the impact on its bottom line. “With regard to PlayStation (PS5) hardware, we have been able to offset the rise in memory prices through adjustments to promotions and pricing, as well as additional cost-reduction, and we expect hardware profitability for the current fiscal year to remain on par with the previous fiscal year,” it said.
“Regarding memory procurement for next fiscal year, based on discussions held so far with various suppliers, we have aligned on the quantity of memory needed for our projected hardware unit sales,” it continued.
Wesley is IGN’s Managing Editor. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].