The China Mail - Capcom looks to extend 'golden age' with sci-fi action game 'Pragmata'

Following the adventures of an astronaut trapped on a moon base overrun by hostile robots, the new game set for release on Friday combines tense shootouts with puzzle-based hacking, allowing players to weaken enemies mid-gunfight.

The game mechanic is creatively represented on screen by an android in the form of a girl who accompanies the protagonist.

Professional game reviewers have handed the new title a respectable average score of 86/100, according to aggregation site Metacritic.

Capcom's previous release, February's "Resident Evil Requiem", has already sold more than six million copies, leading the charts in many countries and firing up purchases of the series' back catalogue.

That success likely powered the studio towards its target of 190 billion yen ($1.2 billion) in net sales in its 2025-26 financial year, which ended on March 31.

Such results would drastically set Capcom apart from a games industry mired in post-pandemic doldrums, with many publishers closing studios and laying off staff to remain solvent or protect profit margins.

- Discipline -

"Capcom is currently in its golden generation and seems to make almost no big mistakes as a corporation," said Serkan Toto of consultancy Kantan Games.

The Osaka-based company, founded in 1983, has been growing for more than 10 years.

A second building is under construction near Capcom HQ to accommodate new staff, after the company surged from 3,200 people in 2022 to more than 3,760 last year.

"Capcom's discipline as a studio has been extremely high for a long time now, with a high focus on quality, building on top of existing hit IPs and shipping on time," Toto said.

"Part of that discipline includes what Capcom is not doing," such as "blindly acquiring other studios" or "jumping on live-service (online multiplayer) games," he added.

Other industry giants have burned their fingers in recent years, such as Sony with its team-based shooter "Concord" -- pulled offline after less than two weeks.

- Risk-taking -

Stepping off the beaten path is rarely profitable in the games industry, with even Capcom bearing the scars of previous attempts.

"Pragmata" is its third recent effort at a new game universe, after 2023's "Exoprimal" and "Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess" the following year -- "both of which failed", noted Toyo Securities analyst Hideki Yasuda.

"Pragmata" will be released for PC, Playstation 5, Xbox Series and Nintendo's new Switch 2 console.

Offering the game on Nintendo's less powerful hardware is a rare choice among high-end productions.

"Since Capcom develops its own game engine (the software that powers features like graphics and physics), it can adapt to the hardware much more quickly than competitors," Yasuda said.

That allows the studio to reach a larger market of players across different platforms.

In some European markets, the Switch 2 version of the latest "Resident Evil" title accounted for around five percent of sales, according to specialist outlet The Game Business.

That was "not a big figure, but five percent of a high selling product can still be significant and profitable", the site commented.

Capcom is also casting a wide net to snare new gamers with feature-length films and TV series adapted from its universes.

New "Resident Evil" and "Street Fighter" films are both expected in cinemas this year.

U.Feng--ThChM