THQ 2012 Annual Report Download - page 5

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this past year of executing on this strategy.
The talented team at Volition created a high
quality, over-the-top gaming experience, and
our marketing team successfully drove demand
during an extremely competitive release
window. On the digital and community front, we
engaged the community and created demand
with our “Initiation Station” online promotion,
and then executed on a successful launch of
multiple tranches of downloadable content.
A key part of our strategy is to build franchises
for the next generation of consoles at or shortly
after they are launched. We have promising
new games that will be ready early in the next
cycle. We also have several franchises that we
can continue to expand into the next generation
cycle.
In fiscal 2012, we continued to invest strategically
in tools to improve product positioning, quality,
and predictability. This includes increased
investment and usage of our internal usability
laboratory, consumer metric tools, our online
service capability to improve the customer
experience, and our digital platform to maximize
the monetization of our properties.
Product Pipeline
Our eagerly-awaited fiscal 2013 line-up will
continue the recent momentum from this year,
beginning with Darksiders II in August. Building
on the success of the first game, the excellent
team at Vigil has created a massive sequel with
roughly double the content of the original, to
be supported by double the marketing spend
of the first game. Metrics like preorder trends,
consumer awareness, and community growth
are very encouraging and make us confident in
the potential for this title’s success.
We will release our annual WWE game, WWE ’13,
in time for the holiday season, building on the
successful rebranding from last year, including
continued integration with WWE programming
and marketing. We are also continuing to
upgrade our technology in both online features
and service, and expect increased digital
revenues from WWE this year. We are pleased to
say that our online WWE community is thriving,
with over 1.7 million Facebook fans, and we
intend to grow that community substantially.
The sequel to our award-winning World War II
PC strategy game, Company of Heroes, debuts
in our fiscal fourth quarter. Company of Heroes
2 builds upon the success of the first game,
which had a 93 Metacritic score and is one of the
highest rated strategy games of all time. The
title will have robust digital post-launch content,
designed to engage, retain, and monetize this
strong community.
Metro: Last Light is the sequel to Metro 2033, a
title that earned its reputation as a sleeper hit,
and boasts one of our strongest, most passionate
communities. THQ will be supporting Metro:
Last Light with a highly competitive marketing
and PR campaign that launched at E3. We also
expect significant digital revenues from this
game, both from direct PC download sales and
a robust post-launch digital content strategy.
Finally, South Park: The Stick of Truth is
scheduled for release in the fiscal fourth quarter
and harnesses the creative minds behind the
hit show, as well as Obsidian Entertainment,
a leading studio in the RPG genre. The game
immerses players in the world of South Park,
and is designed to be the definitive experience,
with writing and voice acting coming directly
from the show’s creators.
Looking at fiscal 2014 and beyond, we believe
our lineup has true breakout potential. Our