Nexon Q1 net income rises 118% to $360.7m

Nexon posted record quarterly results, with revenue up 34% year-over-year to ¥152.2 billion and operating income up 40% to ¥58.2 billion. Net income rose 118% to ¥57.2 billion, but that included a ¥14.5 billion foreign exchange gain, so the bottom line is stronger than the underlying operating trend alone suggests.

For developers, the most interesting part is where the growth came from: Arc Raiders and MapleStory. Arc Raiders added 4.6 million units in the quarter, reaching 16 million total sales, and Nexon says players have already logged 1.5 billion hours. Horizontal revenues jumped 188% to ¥59.3 billion, while MapleStory franchise revenue rose 42% thanks to MapleStory: Idle RPG and MapleStory Worlds.

There’s also a cautionary note. Nexon took a ¥6.7 billion revenue hit and a ¥3.5 billion operating income hit from refunds tied to a coding error in MapleStory: Idle RPG, where probability/statistical values for paid items were misapplied. That’s a reminder that live-service monetization bugs can become expensive fast, both financially and reputationally.

Strategically, Nexon is trimming and reallocating: three projects were cancelled, funding was added to Nakwon: Last Paradise and Woochi the Wayfarer, and creative talent was moved toward projects aimed at a global audience. The company still has 15 games/experiences in development, five due this year, while its Q2 outlook is down versus last year because of tougher comparisons in Dungeon & Fighter and Mabinogi Mobile.