Capcom to explore more remasters

Capcom should double-down on remakes and remasters to help fill out its release slate and provide long-term revenues.

Capcom is quite an interesting company. The Japanese games-maker has a wealth of unique, wholly-owned IPs that it leverages for sequels, spin-offs, and of course remasters--in fact, it has some of the most renown franchises in history like Resident Evil, Monster Hunter, Street Fighter and Mega Man. Over the last few quarters we've seen Capcom push remasters and re-releases like the newly launched Mega Man X collection and upcoming Resident Evil 2 Remake, and this isn't something that'll end any time soon.

In its recent fiscal Q&A session Capcom affirmed that this strategy will continue onwards. "Regarding remakes and re-releases of titles in our back catalog, we expect to explore these further with a variety of properties as a part of our strategy to utilize our library of IP," the company said in its Q1 earnings.

So what could Capcom be cooking up? More Resident Evil remasters at the very least.

Remember that the company spent a lot of developmental resources on its new proprietary RE Engine. The engine, which was specifically built to power Resident Evil 7, will essentially pave the way for future games in the series as a baseline toolset for devs. The engine is quite flexible, though, and will power both re-releases and new games alike.

Case in point: not only is the RE Engine being used for the upcoming RE2 Remake but it'll also run Capcom's next manline Devil May Cry 5 title.

Taking a look at Capcom's recent financials also gives us a clue about its gameplan. The company raked in a substantial 647% spike in profits during Q1, driven primarily by Monster Hunter: World, and it expects this growth trend to continue throughout the year as it banks on RE2 Remake and DMC 5 sales.

Given this trend, we should see Capcom roll out one or multiple re-releases or remasters every fiscal year across multiple platforms to both catalyze game sales and supplement income. And, of course, re-releases tend to spark back catalog game sales as fans look forward to the launch of specific titles.