Capcom's CEO Kenzo Tsujimoto shared several refreshingly candid thoughts on why Street Fighter V feel short of expectations, through an earnings report that was translated into English today. Street Fighter V was expected to sell 2 million copies by the end of March 2016 but only sold 1.4 million copies.
Capcom believes that based on the company's performance last year, that it thinks "it's best to spend a little more time in developing and running a high-quality title that will perform well globally" in order to succeed over the course of the full year:
For example, some aspects of "Street Fighter V" needed more polish, such as the lack of content and server issues at launch. Accordingly, we feel it's better to give a little more time to development than before, and have made slight adjustments to our portfolio.Profits may take one or two years longer to stack up than initially expected, however we will be firmly strengthening our brands. That being said, even looking at Capcom's growth exclusively, we expect at the very least growth in excess of 10% to continue.
While Tsujimoto believes that this might mean lower short-term sales, but far longer growth potential in the long term.
Hopefully, Street Fighter V's remaining content which includes more characters like Balrog, Ibuki, Juri, and Urien will complete the game's offerings. I plan to re-review Street Fighter V by the end of the year, with the game already being more of a complete package now and less of a "work-in-progress."
