It’s no secret that NCSoft has been struggling over the last few years. Revenues peaked post-COVID in 2022 and have been in steep decline since. 2024 revenues are back below 2017 levels and the company’s stock price has been diving, down 71% over the last 5 years.
While the transition from primarily PC gaming to mobile games have led to a jump in revenues, profitability has declined. Mobile games have to pay large platform fees to Apple and Google which diminshes profitability. NCSoft’s older MMOs like Lineage and Lineage 2 typically don’t pay any platform fees as they were popular before platforms like Steam took off.
While the transition from high margin PC games to lower margin mobile games has led to higher profits at first due to a huge jump in revenue, mobile MMORPGs have proven to have shorter lifespans. Games like World of Warcraft, RuneScape, and Eve Online have remained pretty consistently profitable for decades, whereas there are very few mobile MMORPGs that remain relevant after even 5 years.
The decline of PC games for NCSoft has been swift. Currently a single mobile game, Lineage M, accounts for more revenue than every PC game combined for NCSoft:
This mobile/pc game split was even more extreme in the past. Lineage W in 2022 generated almost 3x as much revenue as all their PC games combined. Lineage W’s revenues have declined significantly since.
While NCSoft’s Throne and Liberty had a strong launch, the game’s playerbase has declined quickly.
NCSoft hasn’t had any real big hits since the mobile launch of Lineage 1 and 2. Perhaps Aion 2, which is expected to launch in the second half of 2025, will be a much needed success. But given NCSoft’s recent history, that’s unlikely.
