Disney discontinues Disney Infinity because it lost $147 million for it

Earlier today, Disney Interactive announced that Disney Infinity, its flagship video game, would be discontinued. The reason for the nixing of the game was rather simple: Disney Infinity wasn’t making any money.

According to Disney CFO Christine McCarthy during today’s Q2 earnings conference call, the cut was due to a huge loss in revenues from the game in the past months. In total, the game lost Disney $147 million during Q2. Disney CEO Bob Iger said on the call that he praised the developers for creating a great product, but couldn’t ignore the financial risks like creating the toy inventory for the game as a publisher. As a result, many layoffs have happened at Disney Infinity HQ in Glendale, CA.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise to those who were following the numbers though. Many analysts predicted the discontinuation when Disney folded its Consumer Products and Interactive into one segment. That allowed the Company to fold its huge Disney Infinity losses and hide them until they couldn’t be hidden anymore.

Now with the game gone, Disney’s business strategy for gaming will rely on what it makes the most money on: licensing. “Going forward our console games strategy will focus solely on licensing our great portfolio of content,” said McCarthy. That includes getting licensing revenues from games such as the hit Star Wars games (Battlefront, etc.).

Current Disney Infinity players can still play with their current game releases. John Blackburn, SVP & GM of Infinity said in his statement that two final retail releases for Finding Dory and Alice Through The Looking Glass will come soon out soon. “Our goal for Disney Infinity was to bring the best of Disney storytelling to life in homes around the world, and with your support we accomplished that,” said Blackburn.

Like what you see here on DisneyExaminer? Help support us grow and be rewarded with even more content and experiences by becoming a DisneyExaminer Patron!