NCsoft is apparently off to a good start in 2009 -- notwithstanding Richard Garriott's lawsuit -- thanks to "solid maintenance" of Lineage and Lineage II, along with sales of its new MMO, Aion. The publisher's sales were up 51 percent year-over-year to $107.7 million in the first quarter, with net income enhanced to $27 milllion, a 315 percent increase. It appears the Korean-based company's numerous international workforce cuts paid off.

NCsoft's CFO, Jaeho Lee, was happy that Aion's launch did not affect the performance of the Lineage series in Korea. Now we wait to see how the rest of the globe embraces Aion. The MMO is prepped to launch in China during Q2, with other major markets set for the second half of the year.

Capcom Europe revealed today -- and reiterated in a few cases -- the release schedule for its titles in the first quarter of 2009.

• February TBA - Flock (XBLA/PSN)
  
• February 20 - Street Fighter IV (X360/PS3)
• February 27- Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop (Wii)
  
• February 27- Neopets Puzzle Adventure (Wii/DS/PC)
  
• March 13 - Resident Evil 5 (X360/PS3)
  
• March TBA - MotoGP (Wii)
  
• Q1-2 TBA - Bionic Commando (X360/PS3)
  

All these dates are believed to be official European release dates. We're currently awaiting Capcom US to release its own list of dates (if it even plans to do so). We'll update if anything changes.

Update: Added Capcom's North American information after the break.
Update 2: Bionic Commando will not be hitting Europe in March. The timetable is the same as the US: in the first half of '09.

To the surprise of, well, no one, Nintendo had a pretty stellar first fiscal quarter of 2008, raking in a net profit of nearly 1 billion dollars (107.2 billion yen). Wii hardware was responsible for $5.17 million of that profit, which is an increase of almost $1.75 million from last year's fiscal Q1. Meanwhile, Wii software raked in $40.41 million (up $24.42 million).

Mario Kart Wii and Wii Fit were part of the reason for this software success, since in the quarter Wii Fit sold 3.42 million copies and Mario Kart sold a whopping 6.42 million units. And, if you weren't yet convinced that Nintendo deserves the "printing money" meme, the company is projected to bring in a net profit of about $3 billion dollars for the year.

We don't know about you, but our own wallets and bank accounts are growling with envy.

Update: Fixed some typos. Thanks for the heads up, Sonic_13!

[Via NeoGAF]

When it was introduced to the masses, digital distribution of games and content seemed too crazy to work. Press a few buttons and a game is delivered to me ... legally? Well sunshine, it did work and for EA it worked out really well.

During their fiscal Q1 conference call, Electronic Arts announced it has generated over $90 million in revenue through digital distribution. Ostensibly compiled from data of sales via the EA Store and downloadable content on consoles, the $90m shot in the arm accounted for 11% of EA's overall quarterly revenue ($804m in total).

To think, if those Battlefield: Bad Company weapons did go for sale EA would make like $90.1m -- because we all have that one friend who would think it was a good idea. And by friend we mean the guy we just deleted from our Friend's List, because that dude's a fool.

[via Joystiq]

While NPD reports are great for tallying up the sales of actual physical games – you know, like on discs and what not – a rapidly growing segment of the video game industry operates outside their purview, performing the mysterious (and often times lucrative) alchemy of turning bits slung digitally over the internet into cold, hard cash.

Electronic Arts shared some figures during their fiscal Q1 conference call, announcing it generated over $90 million in revenue through digital distribution in that three month period. Those figures are ostensibly gathered from digital sales of PC games on the EA Store, not to mention downloadable content for video game consoles (insert your own joke here about Battlefield weapons here). Sized up against EA's overall quarterly revenue of $804m, digital distribution accounts for an impressive 11% of that total and, we're quite certain, will continue to grow.

Monolithic publisher EA has reported the preliminary financial results for its first fiscal quarter, ended June 30, 2008, and noted a dramatic increase in net revenues. Despite sales rising $409 million to $804 million (more than double that of Q1 2007's $395 million), the publisher still suffered a net loss of $95 million, which according to our admittedly rudimentary mathematical abilities, is smaller than the previous year's $132 million. We want net loss to be smaller, right?

EA's rise in sales can be attributed to the strong commercial performance of titles like UEFA Euro 2008, the "continued strength" of Rock Band and Battlefield: Bad Company, which managed to shift 1.6 million copies. "We are now seeing the early returns of the change agenda we started last year," stated CEO John Riccitiello. He went on to use words like "innovation" and "quality" to describe EA's forthcoming lineup, calling it "the best title portfolio in the company's history." We would totally agree, especially after experiencing the publisher's strong E3 showing ... but we're worried that doing so might just trigger Armageddon.

GameStop reported $62.1 million in earnings (a 151% increase) year-over-year for its first quarter ending on May 3. GameDaily reports the company also saw a 42% increase in sales to $1.8 billion, with new game sales giving a nice bump to the company, thanks to major releases during the period like GTA IV, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Mario Kart Wii, RSV 2 and Army of Two.

GameStop's CEO R. Richard Fontaine maintains a "bullish" outlook for the rest of the year. He states the company's data shows that hardware sales grew incrementally higher in 2007 than in any other year and he expects a similar performance in 2008. Fontaine maintains GameStop is well on its way to opening about 600 stores in 2008, with half those located outside the US. The company also raised its guidance for the full fiscal year to show around 30% growth over the megatons of cash it made last year. Working conditions and customer service be damned, there be money in dem dar pawnshops for stockholders!

MCV takes a look at some recent ChartTrack sales data and notes that British game sales for the first few weeks of the new year are up significantly over 2006's already record-breaking first quarter. An interesting little factoid, to be sure, but the true importance comes out in a quote from Eidos UK's Jon Brooke, who told the trade paper that increased Winter sales "prove the industry doesn't need to be so seasonal."

Amen to that. We are sick and tired of publishers clogging up store shelves with big name titles around Christmastime only to leave us with months of nothing once the new year comes around. Fortunately, this trend looks like it might be slowing, with quality releases like WarioWare: Smooth Moves, Crackdown, and MotorStorm filling in the quiet Winter months. It's about time publishers realized that good games will sell no matter what time of year they're released.

[Via Guardian GamesBlog]

So what makes a drought? When our cohorts at Joystiq posted the following -- Nintendo's official word on the upcoming sixteen games that will round out Q1, there was some discussion regarding whether a library of 40 titles constitutes a deluge or a drought. Here's the list, per Nintendo:

• Feb. 14 Wii Play with Wii Remote
• Mar. 27 Disney's Meet the Robinsons
• Mar. Bust-A-Move Bash
  
• Mar. Prince of Persia Rival Swords
• Mar. TMNT (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles)
• Mar. Bionicle Heroes
• Mar. Blazing Angels Squadrons of WWII
• Q1 Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07
• Q1 SSX Blur
• Q1 The Godfather Blackhand Edition
• Q1 Medal of Honor: Vanguard
• Q1 Sonic and the Secret Rings

So there's the obvious question of how you feel about the way the Wii's library is shaping up, but the deeper question is ... how many games do we need? It seems most of us would rather have skinnier libraries with nothing but quality games than a new subpar sports title or FPS every week. We're not sure that every one of these titles is gonna reflect the quality we'd like to see, but it doesn't seem thin.

Last, but not at all least, you may notice that we didn't include Mario Party 8, which is apparently slated for March 5. Since it wasn't on Nintendo's list, we left it out here, but that date is still listed on Nintendo's official site.

Microsoft released its first fiscal quarter earnings report earlier this week, beating Wall Street estimates to the tune of $10.81 billion in revenue. That's an 11% increase over the same period last year. The Entertainment & Device division, which includes our favorite next-gen console, reported year-to-year growth of 70%, with 6 million next-gen consoles sold worldwide so far. In other positive news, the company boasts of record cumulative attach rates for software and peripherals, with Xbox Live surpassing 4 million members. Shrugging off skepticism from egghead analysts, MS Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell said the software giant remains confident it will meet its target of 10 million Xbox 360s shipped by the end of 2006.

Since this is a fanboy site, we won't quibble with the difference between "shipped" and actually sitting in somebody's living room. Of course, if you're eager to help MS reach the 10 million milestone, you can always buy Xbox 360s for your extended family this Christmas, plus an extra one for the place in Tahoe.