Frontier announces new Jurassic World game after 'strong' 2021

(Sharecast News) - Video games developer and publisher Frontier Developments announced Jurassic World Evolution 2, the sequel to 2018's successful Jurassic World Evolution, and updated the market on its trading following the end of its 2021 financial year on Friday.
The AIM-traded firm said Jurassic World Evolution 2 would build on the "major success" of Jurassic World Evolution, which was its biggest selling game to date, released in June 2018.

It said it was the "major global licensed intellectual property title" which it had previously referred to on its future roadmap, adding that it would release later in the calendar year.

Looking at its trading, Frontier reported continued strong performance across its game portfolio, delivering record annual revenue for the year ended 31 May, with provisional unaudited revenue sitting at about £91m.

Elite Dangerous: Odyssey, the company's major expansion for the 2014 space title Elite Dangerous, released on PC on 19 May.

Covid-related development challenges continued to be well-managed, the board said, but added that for "prudent planning reasons" it now expected that its F1 2022 management game could release early in the 2021 financial year, after 1 June 2022, as opposed to late in the 2022 financial year.

Based on the expected ongoing performance of the existing portfolio, combined with an "exciting" release schedule for the 2022 financial year, including Jurassic World Evolution 2, the board said its projected revenue range for the year was £130m to £150m, which assumed the F1 2022 management game was released early in the 2021 fiscal period.

For the 2023 financial year, the board's projected revenue range was £160m to £180m, based on the expected performance of its current and future game franchises, together with a "growing contribution" from its games label for third-party publishing, Frontier Foundry.

"We are delighted to reveal Jurassic World Evolution 2 as our next major internally developed game release," said chief executive officer David Braben.

"We are excited to unveil to the player community of our largest commercial success to date the significant gameplay enhancements and innovations that we have been able to create to make this new experience even more compelling that the original.

"We are proud to have achieved record annual revenue in the 2021 financial year from continued global engagement with our four existing major self-published titles, without a new franchise release."

Braben said it was "testament" to the support of the company's "player communities" and its model of post-launch content, as well as its ability to reach new players on existing and new platforms.

"A record number of players have engaged with Frontier games in the last 12 months.

"As we start our next financial year our target is to grow sales by over 50% above the record revenue just achieved, through the launch of Jurassic World Evolution 2 - a major sequel for our biggest game to date, the performance of our existing portfolio, including the console release of Elite Dangerous: Odyssey, new paid and free downloadable content across our titles, and at least three new titles from our excellent external development partners published by Frontier Foundry, including Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters, announced just a few days ago."

At 0932 BST, shares in Frontier Developments were down 7.03% at 2,440p.