Today Paradox Interactive shared its Q4 2023 financial results on top of the overall results for the full year 2023, including a sales milestone for Cities: Skylines 2.
Sales for Q4 (between October and December 2023) were 995.6 million SEK (Swedish Krona), up 72% year-on-year. Operating profit was 123.9 million SEK, down 49 % year-on-year. This includes 175.8 million SEK in writedowns.
Looking at the full year, sales were 2,642.1 million SEK, up 34% year-on-year, while operating profit was 657.9 million SEK, down 26% year-on-year.
In the dedicated financial conference, we hear that sales set a record for both the quarter and the year, and monthly active users reached a record level as well.
We hear from CEO Fredrik Wester that the company has a strong financial position but is unhappy with the quality of the games released during the quarter. Profit also isn't at the level that Parado would like due to the writeoffs, including the losses due to the commercial failure of Hairebrained Schemes' Lamplighters League.
Speaking of the recently released Cities: Skylines 2, Wester admits that players' expectations about performance or the delayed release on consoles, on top of the lack of mod support at launch. Yet, he mentioned that it still sold well because the underlying game is "really good." It passed one million copies sold after the end of 2023.
The developers are currently working very hard on improvement and Wester pledged that the game is along-term engagement for Paradox and will be developed for many years to come.
Later in the Q&A session he mentioned that improving performance is the top priority, followed by adding mod support, the console release, and continuing to support the game with DLC going forward.
We hear that Paradox currently has 9 main games in development. These don't include games from Paradox Arc, but it includes already announced games like Life by You, Prison Architect 2, Millennia, and Foundry, while some are unannounced.
Just today, Paradox announced a new round of DLC for its popular grand strategy game Crusader Kings III.
