The shares of the majority of publicly traded AAA game companies in Japan rose to all-time highs during February and March 2025, as reported by industry analyst Dr. Serkan Toto on Kantan Games. This includes major players Sony, Nintendo, Konami, Capcom and Bandai Namco.
The AAA games industry has been facing worsening conditions in recent years, with mass layoffs, studio closures and cancelled games becoming a distressingly common occurrence in the West. But amidst this, Japan’s major game and console developers have been showing strong performance. While peaks in share price are influenced by wider economic factors, the five aforementioned game companies have, as Kantan Games notes, been performing very well over the past few years.
Nintendo and Sony have maintained their dominance in the console market with the Nintendo Switch and PS5 respectively, and, combined with its track record in the mobile and sports game market, Konami has made a successful comeback into the AAA scene with hit releases like Silent Hill 2 driving profits. This momentum is not likely to stop either, as Konami is set to release the much-awaited Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater and Silent Hill f.
Capcom on the other hand, has seen growth (in operating profit) for the last 13 consecutive years thanks to its consistency in releasing new hits and clever sales strategies for catalogue titles. The company is on track to update its 13-year-run as its annual plan for the current fiscal year relies heavily on Monster Hunter Wilds – which has seen massive commercial success so far, selling over 8 million copies in three days.
That’s not to say that everything is perfect, as Bandai Namco Holdings, for instance, recently incurred large financial losses due to the discontinued MMORPG Blue Protocol, dissolved its online game subsidiary and reduced staff by 100 people (which is rumored to have been executed using some unsavory business practices). On the flip side, the company expects to see the highest profits since its founding as the 2024 fiscal year wraps up. Although Bandai Namco does a lot more than just games, a big contributor to these profits are titles like Elden Ring and its Shadows of the Erdtree DLC, as well as Dragon Ball Sparking ZERO, which saw tremendous success outside of Japan.
When it comes to layoffs, it’s important to mention that part of why they don’t tend to happen in Japan is due to the country’s labor laws. However, this is not the only reason, as major Japanese game companies continue to be profitable enough to keep hiring (albeit some sources say that hiring power has declined in recent years). Moreover, companies are also improving conditions for their developers, as Konami recently raised base salaries for the fourth year in a row, and Capcom started offering more competitive starting salaries to attract new talent.
