Profits up for Sega despite "harsh" physical sales

Digital sales of Phantasy Star Online 2 and smartphone titles have helped Sega's games business grow.

Sales for the nine months to December 31, 2013, were up 48 percent to 303.9 billion yen ($2.9 billion) with profits of 44.3 billion yen ($434.5 million).

"In the consumer business, although the group launched multiple titles including Football Manager 2014 and Sonic Lost World in the packaged game software field, sales were low due to the harsh market environment," said the company.

The company shipped less games in the period that last year - only 6.3 million units worldwide.

Online RPG Phantasy Star Online 2 was one of the highlights and the company also noted 6 million downloads of smartphone game Puyopuyo Quest and 2 million downloads of Chain Chronicle.