It’s Friday, which means it’s time to play one of my favorite weekend games: Check out what a top-tier gaming executive is saying about the industry. Today’s subject is Nexon CEO Owen Mahoney. Readers will recall that Nexon posted its second quarter earnings earlier this week, admitting that it had performed poorly because of a bad investment into bitcoin as well as unrest over lockbox transparency in MapleStory Korea.
Naturally, analysts grilled the company about this as well as its refusal to talk about launch dates for upcoming games. Mahoney turned the tables on them quickly, arguing that crunching to make arbitrary dates was a self-destructive sham.
“Crunch mode is one of the most pernicious problems in our industry. The charade of launch timing serves little purpose except this dance with equity analysts. […] Instead, the right thing to focus and push for is a game that blows people’s minds. If we achieve that, the game will last many years, and the revenues will dwarf what we would have made by launching a quarter or two earlier. […] I’m sorry nobody in my industry has explained this to you before. Within the industry, we all know it’s true, and yet few talk about it openly. Everyone should. So rather than giving you a date, this team is going to give to our customers and employees a commitment to make the best game we can, as soon as we can.”
As VentureBeat notes, it’s not the first time Mahoney has delivered a truth-bomb – and Nexon’s stock rallied in response.
