美商藝電 (EA) 2018 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Good afternoon. My name is Jennifer, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Electronic Arts First Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) Thank you.

午安.我叫詹妮弗，今天我將擔任你們的會議接線生。在此，我謹代表藝電公司歡迎各位參加2018年第一季財報電話會議。（操作說明）謝謝。

And I would like to turn the call over to Mr. Chris Evenden. Sir, please go ahead.

現在我想把電話交給克里斯·埃文登先生。先生，請繼續。

Thanks, Jennifer. Welcome to EA's First Quarter Fiscal 2018 Earnings Call. With me on the call today are Andrew Wilson, our CEO; and Blake Jorgensen, our CFO. Please note that our SEC filings and our earnings release are available at ir.ea.com. In addition, we have posted earnings slides to accompany our prepared remarks. Lastly, after this call, we will post our prepared remarks, an audio replay of this call, our financial model and a transcript. With regard to our calendar, our Annual Shareholder Meeting will be on Thursday, August 3, here in Redwood Shores.

謝謝你，珍妮弗。歡迎參加EA 2018財年第一季財報電話會議。今天和我一起參加電話會議的有我們的執行長 Andrew Wilson 和我們的財務長 Blake Jorgensen。請注意，我們的美國證券交易委員會文件和盈利報告可在 ir.ea.com 上查閱。此外，我們也發布了收益報告投影片，以配合我們準備好的演講稿。最後，在本次通話結束後，我們將公佈我們準備好的發言稿、本次通話的錄音回放、我們的財務模型和通話記錄。關於我們的日程安排，我們的年度股東大會將於 8 月 3 日星期四在紅木海岸舉行。

This presentation and our comments include forward-looking statements regarding future events and the future financial performance of the company. Actual events and results may differ materially from our expectations. We refer you to our most recent Form 10-K for a discussion of risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from those discussed today. Electronic Arts makes these statements as of today, July 27, 2017, and disclaims any duty to update them. During this call, the financial metrics, with the exception of free cash flow, will be presented on a GAAP basis. All comparisons made in the course of this call are against the same period in the prior year, unless otherwise stated.

本次演示和我們的評論包含有關未來事件和公司未來財務表現的前瞻性陳述。實際事件和結果可能與我們的預期有重大差異。有關可能導致實際結果與今天討論的結果有重大差異的風險，請參閱我們最新的 10-K 表格。Electronic Arts 於 2017 年 7 月 27 日發表上述聲明，並聲明不承擔更新這些聲明的義務。本次電話會議中，除自由現金流外，所有財務指標均以美國通用會計準則 (GAAP) 列示。除非另有說明，本次電話會議中所做的所有比較均與去年同期進行比較。

Now I'll turn the call over to Andrew.

現在我把電話交給安德魯。

Thanks, Chris. Our first quarter of FY '18 was an outstanding start to an exciting year for Electronic Arts. Engagement in our live services across console, PC and mobile was exceptional, demonstrating the strength of our digital business that evolves daily to meet the needs of our players. Revenue and EPS for the quarter were above our guidance, and we had our highest Q1 operating cash flow in EA history.

謝謝你，克里斯。2018 財年第一季對於藝電來說是一個精彩的開端，也預示著令人興奮的一年即將到來。我們在主機、PC 和行動平台上的即時服務參與度非常高，這充分展現了我們數位業務的實力，該業務每天都在不斷發展以滿足玩家的需求。本季營收和每股盈餘均超出預期，並且我們實現了EA史上最高的第一季經營現金流。

Our live services today continue to grow with more passionate players connecting with their friends through our network and having more fun with the games they love. Our EA SPORTS live services were thriving through Q1, engaging more players on multiple platforms. Unique players in Ultimate Team grew 11% year-over-year through Q1. In our mobile businesses, FIFA Mobile expanded to more than 95 million unique players, and NBA Live Mobile grew to more than 70 million unique players. Our Sims community continues to be strong: monthly active players in The Sims 4 increased more than 20% year-over-year in Q1, and we're excited to have a new Sims Mobile game in soft launch. And in Battlefield 1, our community has grown to 21 million unique players experiencing an extensive live service, with monthly updates, in-game events and missions and the largest expansion packs in franchise history.

如今，我們的線上服務不斷發展壯大，越來越多的熱情玩家透過我們的網路與朋友聯繫，並在他們喜愛的遊戲中獲得更多樂趣。第一季度，我們的 EA SPORTS 線上服務蓬勃發展，吸引了更多玩家在多個平台上參與。截至第一季度，Ultimate Team 的獨立玩家數量年增 11%。在我們的行動業務中，FIFA Mobile 的用戶數量成長到超過 9,500 萬獨立玩家，NBA Live Mobile 的用戶數量成長到超過 7,000 萬獨立玩家。我們的模擬市民社群依然強勁：第一季《模擬市民4》的每月活躍玩家數量年增超過 20%，我們很高興看到新的《模擬市民》手機遊戲正在進行軟啟動。在《戰地1》中，我們的社群已經發展到 2,100 萬獨立玩家，他們正在體驗廣泛的線上服務，包括每月更新、遊戲內活動和任務，以及該系列歷史上最大的擴充。

As we continue to strengthen player relationships through our live services, we are also innovating with how we reach players outside of our games. Through EA PLAY in June, we engaged a global audience from our event in Hollywood. First, we gave fans the most comprehensive look to date at our FY '18 titles, including Star Wars Battlefront II, FIFA 18, Need for Speed Payback, Madden NFL 18, NBA LIVE 18, and a new EA Originals title in A Way Out, and our stunning new IP, Anthem. The trailers and videos we launched for our games at EA PLAY have together generated more than 115 million views on social channels, twice as many as last year's content. We welcomed nearly 20,000 players to our venue for a celebration of play, and opportunities to go hands-on with our biggest games. Among those attendees were 300 community leaders and content creators, who captured and streamed 1,000 hours of gameplay for our upcoming titles. That content is now being shared among a combined 250 million subscribers worldwide, bringing them closer to the new experiences and excitement we will deliver this year.

在透過我們的線上服務不斷加強與玩家關係的同時，我們也在創新如何與遊戲之外的玩家建立聯繫。透過 EA PLAY 在 6 月於好萊塢舉辦的活動，我們吸引了全球觀眾的注意。首先，我們向粉絲們全面展示了我們 2018 財年的遊戲陣容，包括《星際大戰：前線 II》、《FIFA 18》、《極品飛車：復仇》、《麥登橄欖球 18》、《NBA LIVE 18》以及 EA Originals 的全新遊戲《逃出生天》，還有我們令人驚豔的全新 IP聖歌。我們在 EA PLAY 上發布的遊戲預告片和影片在社群媒體上的總觀看次數超過 1.15 億次，是去年內容的兩倍。我們迎來了近 20,000 名玩家來到我們的場地，共同慶祝遊戲的樂趣，並有機會親身體驗我們最熱門的遊戲。與會者中有 300 位社群領袖和內容創作者，他們為我們即將推出的遊戲錄製並直播了 1000 小時的遊戲內容。目前，全球共有 2.5 億訂閱用戶正在分享這些內容，讓他們更接近我們今年將帶來的全新體驗和令人興奮的時刻。

Q1 set the foundation for FY '18, and there is much more ahead of us -- new games, more content and pioneering for the future of play.

第一季為 2018 財年奠定了基礎，未來還有更多精彩內容——新遊戲、更多內容以及對未來遊戲方式的開拓。

At Electronic Arts, we're committed to innovation -- for our players and the industry. We are pushing the limit forward. Our focus manifests in 3 key areas that uniquely position EA to lead and drive growth: a core technology base that is unparalleled in our industry, amazing new titles being developed by extraordinary teams, and new models to expand our reach and help more people discover, engage and enjoy the fun of games.

在藝電，我們致力於創新—為了我們的玩家和整個產業。我們正在不斷突破極限。我們的重點體現在三個關鍵領域，這使 EA 能夠以獨特的方式引領和推動成長：業內無與倫比的核心技術基礎、由傑出團隊開發的精彩新遊戲，以及擴大我們影響力並幫助更多人發現、參與和享受遊戲樂趣的新模式。

EA's investments in engine technology, analytics, infrastructure and research continue to fuel advancements in our games, our services and our Player Network. Our industry-leading Frostbite engine is now powering development of a dozen new titles across our portfolio. It is continually engineered alongside our world-class technology platform for games and services, enabling our creative teams to leverage sophisticated data and insights to conceptualize and build the most incredible new experiences for our players. A digital platform provides the scalable infrastructure that powers our multiplayer experiences, connects players to their friends, and updates our games based on player inputs. And across the company, research teams like SEED are working in areas like neural networks derived from our data sets, cloud infrastructure to deliver streaming experiences, virtual humans and AI. These concepts will dramatically shape how players interact and experience games over the next 5 years and beyond.

EA 對引擎技術、分析、基礎設施和研究的持續投入，推動了我們的遊戲、服務和玩家網路的進步。我們業界領先的寒霜引擎目前正在為我們旗下十幾款新遊戲的開發提供動力。它與我們世界一流的遊戲和服務技術平台不斷協同發展，使我們的創意團隊能夠利用複雜的數據和洞察力，為我們的玩家構思和建立最令人難以置信的新體驗。數位平台提供可擴展的基礎設施，為我們的多人遊戲體驗提供支持，將玩家與他們的朋友連接起來，並根據玩家的回饋更新我們的遊戲。在公司內部，像 SEED 這樣的研究團隊正在研究從我們的資料集中提取的神經網路、用於提供串流體驗的雲端基礎設施、虛擬人和人工智慧等領域。這些理念將在未來 5 年及更長時間內，大大影響玩家與遊戲互動和體驗的方式。

Competitive gaming will also continue to fuel growth and evolution in EA's portfolio. Players in titles like FIFA and Madden NFL are up to 3x more engaged when they are playing competitively, and fan feedback from our tournaments has been highly positive. This year, new competitive structures and new mode -- modes are set to expand engagement and drive growth in the digital ecosystem, broadcast and sponsorship. Launching first is Madden NFL, where the size and scope of our competitions in FY '18 will increase substantially from a strong foundation as we deepen our partnership with the NFL and bring esports even closer to the real-world sport. At Gamescom, we'll debut a new way to play Battlefield 1 built for competition, and designed with direct input from our Battlefield community. Through a growing portfolio of digital and traditional broadcast deals, our spectator reach will continue to expand, with major brands set to engage this high-value audience through global sponsorships.

競技遊戲也將持續推動EA產品組合的成長與發展。在 FIFA 和 Madden NFL 等遊戲中，玩家在進行競技比賽時參與度可提高 3 倍，而且我們舉辦的比賽也收到了粉絲的正面回饋。今年，新的競爭結構和新的模式將擴大參與度，並推動數位生態系統、廣播和贊助領域的成長。首先推出的是 Madden NFL，在 2018 財年，我們將以強大的基礎大幅提升與 NFL 的合作，使電子競技與現實世界的體育運動更加緊密地聯繫在一起，從而大幅擴大比賽的規模和範圍。在科隆遊戲展上，我們將首次推出全新的《戰地1》遊戲方式，專為競技而打造，並直接採納了《戰地》社群的意見。透過不斷擴大的數位和傳統廣播合作項目組合，我們的觀眾覆蓋範圍將繼續擴大，各大品牌將透過全球贊助來吸引這一高價值觀眾群體。

Looking to our FY '18 slate of new titles and live services, we are delivering unprecedented levels of innovation. Starting in Q2: FIFA 18 delivers a generational leap forward for the franchise. Frostbite is now enhancing every aspect of the game from visual fidelity to gameplay. The Journey 2 brings a deeper and more personalized story experience, and FIFA Ultimate Team is expanding with the addition of FUT Icons. FIFA's global appeal also continue to grow: FIFA Online in China is one of our fastest-growing sports businesses over the past year.

展望我們 2018 財年的新遊戲和線上服務，我們將帶來前所未有的創新水平。從第二季開始：FIFA 18 為該系列帶來了世代飛躍。Frostbite引擎現在正在提升遊戲的各個方面，從視覺效果到遊戲玩法。《征程2》帶來了更深入、更個人化的故事體驗，而FIFA Ultimate Team也透過新增FUT Icons功能進行了擴展。國際足總的全球吸引力也持續成長：過去一年，國際足總在中國的線上業務是我們成長最快的運動業務之一。

Madden NFL will break new ground for the franchise when it launches in August, powered by Frostbite, delivering a unique take on story mode with Longshot and introducing MUT Champions to power our global esports competitions.

Madden NFL 將於 8 月推出，由 Frostbite 引擎驅動，為該系列遊戲開闢新的道路，透過 Longshot 帶來獨特的劇情模式，並引入 MUT Champions 來支援我們的全球電子競技比賽。

NHL 18 will have the most ways to team up and compete with friends in franchise history -- 60 combinations of co-op and online multiplayer, including a brand-new NHL THREES mode.

NHL 18 將提供該系列歷史上最多的與朋友組隊和比賽的方式——60 種合作和線上多人遊戲組合，包括全新的 NHL THREES 模式。

And Battlefield 1 will continue to evolve as a content-rich live service, with monthly game updates, and our next expansion pack, In The Name of the Tsar, launching in full in September. In addition, at Gamescom, we will detail our plans for a new offering that will bring the richest Battlefield 1 experience yet -- including the all-out warfare, epic multiplayer battles and War Stories campaign that have defined the game, plus new maps, deeper progression and additional fan-favorite game modes, all in a single package.

《戰地1》將繼續發展成為內容豐富的線上服務，每月都會推出遊戲更新，我們的下一個擴充包《以沙皇之名》將於9月全面發布。此外，在科隆遊戲展上，我們將詳細介紹我們的新計劃，該計劃將帶來迄今為止最豐富的《戰地1》體驗——包括定義了這款遊戲的全面戰爭、史詩般的多人遊戲戰鬥和戰爭故事戰役，以及新地圖、更深層次的進度和更多粉絲喜愛的遊戲模式，所有這些都包含在一個軟體包中。

In Q3, we'll deliver new games in some of our most popular global IP: Need for Speed Payback will excite fans with its adrenaline-fueled, action-driving experience, signature car customization, new story and new characters.

第三季度，我們將推出一些最受歡迎的全球IP的新遊戲：《極速快感：復仇》將以其腎上腺素飆升的動作駕駛體驗、標誌性的汽車定制、新故事和新角色讓粉絲們興奮不已。

Yesterday, we announced that The Sims 4 is coming to Xbox One and PlayStation 4 players this November, bringing the same unique gameplay and self-expression from the PC game to console players. Much of the content added post-launch on PC will be included, with more game modes and updates to come.

昨天，我們宣布《模擬市民4》將於今年11月登陸Xbox One和PlayStation 4平台，將PC版遊戲的獨特玩法和自我表達體驗帶給主機玩家。PC版發售後新增的大部分內容都將包含在內，未來也將推出更多遊戲模式和更新。

Finally, Star Wars Battlefront II will bring the unforgettable Star Wars experience that fans want: a game 3x the size of the previous title, with a new single-player story, iconic space battles, deeper multiplayer and a new, event-driven live service model that will keep the community together long after launch. Anticipation and excitement for this game continues to grow: our trailers and user-generated content for Battlefront II have received more than 117 million views to date, up more than 1/3 from our previous game.

最後，《星際大戰：前線 II》將帶來粉絲們夢寐以求的難忘的星際大戰體驗：遊戲規模是前作的三倍，擁有全新的單人故事、標誌性的太空戰鬥、更深入的多人遊戲以及全新的、以活動為驅動的在線服務模式，這將使玩家社區在遊戲發布後很長一段時間內保持活躍。玩家對這款遊戲的期待和興奮之情持續高漲：迄今為止，《星際大戰：前線 II》的預告片和用戶生成內容已獲得超過 1.17 億次觀看，比上一款遊戲增加了超過三分之一。

We are also focused on growing our reach and encouraging more players around the world. Our live services are continually evolving to connect more players with new experiences, like our unique model for Star Wars Battlefront II post-launch content, and event-based modes like FUT Champions. As we continue to expand our competitive gaming program across more IP, we are delivering highly engaging broadcast content for esports spectators, one of the fastest-growing audiences in entertainment. And as a publisher, we have pioneered the multi-title subscription service at the platform level with EA Access and Origin Access, enabling players to discover and enjoy more games at tremendous value. Only EA spans this breadth of engagement models today, helping us to reach more players and continually grow our network.

我們也致力於擴大影響力，鼓勵世界各地更多玩家參與。我們的線上服務不斷發展，旨在為更多玩家帶來全新體驗，例如我們為《星際大戰：前線 II》推出後內容而採用的獨特模式，以及 FUT Champions 等基於活動的模式。隨著我們不斷擴大競技遊戲項目在更多IP上的覆蓋範圍，我們正在為電子競技觀眾提供極具吸引力的直播內容，電子競技觀眾是娛樂界增長最快的觀眾群之一。作為發行商，我們率先在平台層面推出了 EA Access 和 Origin Access 等多遊戲訂閱服務，讓玩家能夠以超值的價格發現並享受更多遊戲。目前只有 EA 涵蓋瞭如此廣泛的互動模式，這有助於我們接觸到更多玩家並不斷擴大我們的網路。

There is a lot to be excited about in the quarters to come. We are innovating for our players, for our business and for the industry. Now I'll hand the call over to Blake.

接下來的幾個季度有很多值得期待的事情。我們正在為我們的玩家、我們的業務和整個行業進行創新。現在我把電話交給布萊克。

Thanks, Andrew. We had a great start to the fiscal year, powered by our event-driven live services, particularly FIFA Ultimate Team and our mobile titles. Our operating cash flow was the highest ever for a first quarter and underlines how our growing live services have fundamentally changed our business model, resulting in a more stable and predictable cash flow all year round.

謝謝你，安德魯。本財年開局良好，這主要得益於我們以賽事驅動的即時服務，特別是 FIFA Ultimate Team 和我們的行動遊戲。第一季的經營現金流創歷史新高，這凸顯了我們不斷增長的即時服務如何從根本上改變了我們的商業模式，從而實現了全年更加穩定和可預測的現金流。

I'll report our results on a GAAP basis, then use our operational measure of net sales to discuss the dynamics of our business. To compare this quarter results to historically reported non-GAAP measures, please refer to the relevant tabs in our downloadable financial model.

我將按照公認會計準則報告我們的業績，然後使用我們的淨銷售額營運指標來討論我們業務的動態。若要將本季業績與歷史上報告的非GAAP指標進行比較，請參閱我們可下載的財務模型中的相關標籤。

EA's net revenue was $1.45 billion compared to $1.27 billion a year ago and above our guidance by $24 million. Operating expenses were $552 million, $6 million above our guidance due to phasing. The increase over last year was primarily driven by new product development as we invest in new genres. Operating income was $743 million, and diluted earnings per share was $2.06, $0.13 above our guidance.

EA 的淨收入為 14.5 億美元，而去年同期為 12.7 億美元，比我們預期高出 2,400 萬美元。由於分階段實施，營運支出為 5.52 億美元，比我們先前的預期高出 600 萬美元。與去年相比，成長主要得益於新產品開發，因為我們投資於新的產品類型。營業收入為 7.43 億美元，稀釋後每股收益為 2.06 美元，比我們預期高出 0.13 美元。

Operating cash flow for the quarter was a record $176 million, up $294 million from last year. Remember that the FASB rules regarding the treatment of stock-based compensation have changed, and this affects how we classify our cash flow. Under the old rules, operating cash flow for the first fiscal quarter in 2018 would have been $42 million, up $290 million year-on-year. Under both accounting treatments, operating cash flow was an all-time record for the first quarter. Capital expenditures for the quarter were 300 -- $33 million, resulting in a free cash flow of $143 million. Operating cash flow for the last 12 months was $1.87 billion, our strongest-ever 12 months. See our earnings slide for further cash flow information.

本季經營現金流達到創紀錄的 1.76 億美元，比去年同期成長 2.94 億美元。請記住，FASB 關於股票選擇權激勵處理的規定已經改變，這會影響我們對現金流的分類。依照舊規則，2018 年第一財季的營運現金流為 4,200 萬美元，比上年同期成長 2.9 億美元。無論採用哪一種會計處理方法，第一季的經營現金流均創歷史新高。本季資本支出為 300 - 3300 萬美元，由此產生的自由現金流為 1.43 億美元。過去 12 個月的營運現金流為 18.7 億美元，是我們有史以來最強勁的 12 個月。請參閱我們的獲利情況幻燈片，以了解更多現金流資訊。

During the quarter, we also repurchased 1.4 million shares at a cost of $100 million -- $150 million, leaving $1.08 billion in our 2-year $1.2 billion buyback program we began in May.

本季度，我們也以 1 億美元至 1.5 億美元的價格回購了 140 萬股股票，使我們從 5 月開始的為期 2 年、總額 12 億美元的股票回購計畫還剩下 10.8 億美元。

Our cash and short-term investments at the end of the quarter were $4.47 billion, with 37% of this balance held onshore.

截至季末，我們的現金和短期投資為 44.7 億美元，其中 37% 的餘額位於境內。

Now I'd like to turn to the key drivers of our business this quarter.

現在我想談談本季我們業務的關鍵驅動因素。

Net sales for the quarter were $775 million, up $93 million on the prior year and $25 million above our guidance. There was an FX headwind of approximately $16 million compared to the prior year. The outperformance relative to guidance was driven by Ultimate Team, The Sims 4 and FIFA Online 3. Year-on-year growth was driven by the Mass Effect: Andromeda sales captured in the quarter and by FIFA.

本季淨銷售額為 7.75 億美元，比上年同期成長 9,300 萬美元，比我們預期高出 2,500 萬美元。與前一年相比，外匯匯率波動造成了約 1,600 萬美元的不利影響。業績超越預期主要得益於 Ultimate Team、The Sims 4 和 FIFA Online 3 的強勁表​​現。年比成長主要得益於本季 Mass Effect: Andromeda 的銷售額以及 FIFA 系列遊戲的銷售。

Digital net sales were $681 million, a new record for the first quarter and up $113 million on the year-ago period. The increase reflects strength in live services, together with our Mobile business. In addition, Mass Effect: Andromeda was a significant contributor. Digital sales now represent 63% of our business on a trailing 12-month basis compared to 56% in the prior year.

數位淨銷售額為 6.81 億美元，創第一季新紀錄，比去年同期成長 1.13 億美元。這一成長反映了我們即時服務以及行動業務的強勁表現。此外，《質量效應：仙女座》也做出了重要貢獻。過去 12 個月，數位銷售額占我們業務的 63%，而前一年這一比例為 56%。

Looking at each of the components of this quarter's digital sales in turn: Live services net sales were up 22% year-on-year to $420 million. The growth was broad-based, driven by FIFA Ultimate Team, Battlefield 1 and The Sims 4. The esports mode in FIFA Ultimate Team continues to attract new players and drive engagement. Notably, Sims 4 expansion packs continue to perform extremely well, and the last 12 months have been the best in the title's history. Both EA Access and Origin Access are up year-on-year. Remember, we have merged extra content and subscriptions, ads and other into this new live services category.

依序來看本季數位銷售的各個組成部分：即時服務淨銷售額年增 22%，達到 4.2 億美元。成長基礎廣泛，主要得益於 FIFA Ultimate Team、戰地1、模擬市民4的推動。 FIFA Ultimate Team中的電競模式持續吸引新進業者並提升用戶參與度。值得注意的是，《模擬市民4》的擴充包表現一直非常出色，過去12個月更是該遊戲史上表現最好的時期。EA Access 和 Origin Access 的使用者數量均較去年同期成長。請記住，我們將額外的內容和訂閱、廣告和其他內容合併到這個新的即時服務類別中。

Mobile delivered net sales of $150 million, up 6% year-on-year, with the growth primarily from FIFA Mobile, Galaxy -- Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes and NBA Mobile. FIFA Mobile is continuing along its growth trajectory and beat our expectations by delivering its strongest quarter since launch. June was the strongest month so far for FIFA Mobile, a testament to the ability of the team to create compelling live services for players. In Q1 alone, they released 2 major client upgrades and delivered 10 major content programs.

行動業務淨銷售額達 1.5 億美元，年成長 6%，成長主要來自 FIFA Mobile、Galaxy - Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes 和 NBA Mobile。FIFA Mobile 繼續保持成長勢頭，並取得了自發布以來最強勁的季度業績，超出了我們的預期。6 月是 FIFA Mobile 迄今為止表現最強勁的一個月，證明了團隊有能力為玩家創造引人入勝的即時服務。僅在第一季度，他們就發布了 2 個主要客戶端升級，並交付了 10 個主要內容項目。

Full game PC and console downloads generated net sales of $111 million, 32% higher than last year. This was driven by Mass Effect: Andromeda sales captured in the quarter. 34% of our unit sales are now digital rather than physical, measured on Xbox One and PlayStation 4 over the last 12 months. This compares to just 27% a year ago.

完整遊戲 PC 和主機下載的淨銷售額為 1.11 億美元，比去年增長了 32%。這主要得益於《質量效應：仙女座》在本季的銷售額。過去 12 個月，在 Xbox One 和 PlayStation 4 平台上，我們的銷售量中有 34% 是數位版而不是實體版。相比之下，一年前這一比例僅為 27%。

Turning to guidance: we are reiterating our guidance for the full year.

關於指導意見：我們重申全年指導意見。

For the second quarter, we expect net revenue of $955 million, cost of revenue to be $389 million and operating expenses of $638 million. OpEx is up year-on-year, primarily due to 2 factors: continued investment in new genres and live services and the phasing of marketing expenses. Phasing will be different as we start campaigns earlier for new games and live services. This results in a loss per share of $0.18 for the second quarter. Note that this is calculated using the basic share count of 310 million shares. Should EA report a profit, the diluted share count of 314 million will be used.

我們預計第二季淨收入為 9.55 億美元，營業成本為 3.89 億美元，營運費用為 6.38 億美元。營運支出較去年同期上升，主要歸因於兩個因素：對新類型和現場服務的持續投資以及行銷費用的分階段實施。由於我們會更早啟動新遊戲和線上服務的推廣活動，因此分階段實施的方式會有所不同。這導致第二季每股虧損0.18美元。請注意，這是根據 3.1 億股的基本股數計算得出的。如果 EA 實現獲利，將採用 3.14 億股的稀釋後股份數。

We anticipate net sales for the quarter to be $1.16 billion. This is up 5.6% year-on-year, primarily driven by growth in our sports franchises, offset by an FX headwind of around $18 million. With regard to sports, Madden NFL 18 is a significant step up from last year's game. It's the first Madden on Frostbite, it's the first with a story mode, and we've significantly refined the competitive gaming features in Madden Ultimate Team. FIFA 18 continues to be -- continues the pattern of innovation with the addition of Real Player Motion Technology and Player Personalities, and the second season of the Journey. Also contributing to our excitement around FIFA is the addition of the Nintendo Switch. We will launch FIFA 18 for all 3 console platforms on September 19 -- or 29, excuse me.

我們預計本季淨銷售額為 11.6 億美元。與去年同期相比成長了 5.6%，主要得益於體育特許經營業務的成長，但被約 1,800 萬美元的外匯不利因素所抵消。就運動遊戲而言，《麥登橄欖球18》比去年的遊戲有了顯著的提升。這是第一款採用寒霜引擎的麥登橄欖球遊戲，也是第一款帶有故事模式的麥登橄欖球遊戲，並且我們對麥登橄欖球終極球隊模式的競技遊戲功能進行了大幅改進。FIFA 18 持續保持創新勢頭，新增了真實球員動作技術和球員個性，以及「旅程」模式的第二季。FIFA 的加入也讓我們更興奮，因為 Nintendo Switch 也加入了遊戲。我們將於 9 月 19 日（或 29 日，抱歉）在所有 3 個遊戲主機平台上推出 FIFA 18。

In conclusion, we are delighted with the performance of our business in the first quarter, driven by the growing revenue streams generated by our live services. We've applied our teams to developing competitive or compelling live service events, and this has fundamentally transformed our business model. Our live services continue to grow our profitability and enable us to generate cash all year round.

總而言之，我們對第一季的業務表現感到非常滿意，這主要得益於我們即時服務帶來的不斷增長的收入。我們已將團隊投入到開發具有競爭力或吸引力的現場服務活動中，這從根本上改變了我們的商業模式。我們的即時服務持續提升獲利能力，使我們能夠全年產生現金流。

Now I'll turn the call back to Andrew.

現在我把電話轉回給安德魯。

Thanks, Blake. The future of games is changing. Over 2.5 billion people are estimated to play video games today, and we expect that number will continue to grow. At that scale, the way we connect to, access and play games will continue to evolve. EA is at the leading edge of that transformation.

謝謝你，布萊克。遊戲的未來正在改變。據估計，目前全球有超過25億人玩電子遊戲，我們預計這個數字還會繼續成長。在這種規模下，我們連接、存取和玩遊戲的方式將不斷演變。企業架構正處於這場變革的前沿。

Our creative teams are applying advanced technologies and data intelligence to craft new experiences, like our Longshot mode in Madden NFL 18 and the massive, dynamic environments in Star Wars Battlefront II. But this is just the beginning as we combine the power of our Frostbite engine with our digital platform. With increased processing power on devices and in the cloud, the new frontiers for innovation become deeper forms of personalization, immersive and self-generating worlds, artificial intelligence and deep learning.

我們的創意團隊正在運用先進技術和數據智慧來打造全新的體驗，例如 Madden NFL 18 中的 Longshot 模式和 Star Wars Battlefront II 中龐大、動態的環境。但這只是個開始，我們將把 Frostbite 引擎的強大功能與我們的數位平台結合。隨著設備和雲端處理能力的提升，創新的新前沿領域正在朝向更深層的個人化、沉浸式和自生成的世界、人工智慧和深度學習發展。

As we continue to pioneer for our players, our portfolio will expand in FY '19 and beyond. We will deliver stories that you're able to play, like the Star Wars action-adventure game being developed by the Visceral Games team. Anthem, our new IP from BioWare, will introduce a contiguous open world that is ever-changing and influenced by players, as they band together and support each other in their journeys. Next year will also be a World Cup year in soccer, an added opportunity for us to innovate and engage our massive FIFA audience around the world. We will continue delivering for our Battlefield fans, including the next great game in the franchise. Across our top franchises and new IP, our ongoing focus will be on advancing the state of the art in games for players on every platform.

隨著我們持續為玩家開拓創新，我們的產品組合將在 2019 財年及以後持續擴大。我們將推出您可以親自體驗的故事，例如 Visceral Games 團隊正在開發的《星際大戰》動作冒險遊戲。《聖歌》（Anthem）是 BioWare 的全新 IP，它將引入一個不斷變化的開放世界，並受到玩家的影響，玩家將在旅途中團結起來，互相支持。明年還將是足球世界盃年，這將為我們提供一個額外的機會，讓我們能夠創新並與世界各地龐大的國際足總觀眾群體互動。我們將繼續為《戰地》系列的粉絲帶來精彩作品，包括該系列的下一款偉大作品。我們將持續專注於提升所有平台玩家的遊戲體驗，無論是我們最熱門的遊戲系列還是新的IP。

Delivering new and compelling ways to discover, engage and enjoy games will enable us to reach more players and grow our network. Our live services will continue to expand, hosting thousands of daily, weekly and seasonal in-game events that brings players in deeper. Our competitive gaming programs, from online tournaments to global championship spectacles, will engage more players and spectators in our franchises as the massive esports audience continues to grow. And through our subscriptions and Origin platform, players will be able to seamlessly connect to new experiences from EA's portfolio and beyond.

提供新穎且引人入勝的方式來發現、參與和享受遊戲，將使我們能夠接觸到更多玩家並擴大我們的網路。我們的線上服務將繼續擴展，舉辦數千場每日、每周和季節性的遊戲內活動，讓玩家更深入地參與其中。從線上錦標賽到全球錦標賽盛事，我們的競技遊戲項目將吸引更多玩家和觀眾參與我們的賽事中，因為龐大的電競觀眾群正在不斷增長。透過我們的訂閱服務和 Origin 平台，玩家將能夠無縫連接到 EA 旗下及其他平台的全新遊戲體驗。

We are entering a new era for innovation in the games industry. We believe interactive entertainment will change more in the next 5 years than it has in the last 45, and we are excited to lead that evolution at Electronic Arts.

我們正進入遊戲產業創新發展的新時代。我們相信，未來 5 年互動娛樂的變化將超過過去 45 年的變化，我們很高興能夠引領 Electronic Arts 的這項變革。

Now Blake and I are here for your questions.

現在我和布萊克在這裡回答你們的問題。

(Operator Instructions) And our first question comes from the line of Tim O'Shea with Jefferies.

（操作說明）我們的第一個問題來自 Jefferies 的 Tim O'Shea。

So one of the big announcements at E3 was this new Ultimate Team style mode for Star Wars Battlefront II where gamers can purchase Star Cards to unlock the special in-game abilities. That you guys are doing over $800 million in Ultimate Team revenues. So my question is, how much incremental Ultimate Team style revenue could be generated by Star Wars? And then how much is implicitly included in your outlook, your full year outlook?

E3 遊戲展的一大亮點是《星際大戰：前線 II》的全新終極團隊模式，玩家可以購買星卡來解鎖遊戲中的特殊能力。你們的終極團隊模式收入超過 8 億美元。所以我的問題是，《星際大戰》能為 Ultimate Team 模式帶來多少增量收入？那麼，你的全年展望中又隱含了多少呢？

Yes. So thanks, Tim. Good question. I remind everybody, it took us 8 to 9 years to get Ultimate Team where it is today. Our first year of Ultimate Team was $8 million for FIFA. I think there's a huge possibility for the extra content, live service, event-driven model in nonsports games, but we're also very conscious that it will take time to develop. We have a relatively small amount of that built into this year's forecast. I think if it's successful, we'll start to see the benefits at the tail end of this year and really see the benefits next year. But it's hard for us to really predict at this time exactly how that might play out. Our biggest focus, though, to remember is, we want to just engage all of our users, all of our players, deeply in the game and provide them more ongoing activities, content, events for them to keep coming back and playing. And if that's successful, we think the economics will follow, but more to come as we release that game into the market in November.

是的。謝謝你，提姆。問得好。我提醒大家，我們花了 8 到 9 年的時間才把 Ultimate Team 發展到今天的規模。我們第一年為 FIFA 推出的 Ultimate Team 模式就獲得了 800 萬美元的收入。我認為在非體育遊戲中，額外內容、即時服務和事件驅動模式有著巨大的發展潛力，但我們也非常清楚，這需要時間來發展。今年的預測中，我們已將相對較少的這部分因素納入考量。我認為如果成功的話，我們將在今年年底開始看到成效，並在明年真正看到成效。但目前我們很難準確預測事情會如何發展。不過，我們最關注的是，我們希望讓所有用戶、所有玩家都深度參與遊戲中來，並為他們提供更多持續的活動、內容和賽事，讓他們不斷回來玩遊戲。如果成功，我們認為經濟效益也會隨之而來，但隨著我們在 11 月將這款遊戲推向市場，還有更多消息要公佈。

Your next question comes from the line of Stephen Ju with Crédit Suisse.

你的下一個問題來自瑞士信貸的 Stephen Ju。

So Andrew and Blake, I think we talked about this topic before, but I thought I would bring it up again, given all of the different development efforts at Motive, BioWare, at DICE and Visceral, you're kind of now in a position where it looks like you might have too much product. So does this open up the opportunity for you guys to space out some of the nonsports franchises to maybe every 2 years or maybe even 3 years as opposed to every other year?

所以 Andrew 和 Blake，我想我們之前討論過這個主題，但我想再次提出來，考慮到 Motive、BioWare、DICE 和 Visceral 等公司都在進行各種不同的開發工作，你們現在的情況看起來好像產品太多了。那麼，這是否意味著你們有機會將一些非體育特許經營權的推出間隔延長到每 2 年甚至 3 年，而不是每兩年一次？

Never too much product. I think we like a regular cadence. I think we've found a good cadence, obviously, with Battlefield and with Star Wars Battlefront. We're trying to make sure that we're leveraging our relationship with Disney on the Star Wars property, so aligning those where possible with their theatrical release schedules. So right now our plan is not to change our cadence schedule. Clearly, we don't yet know how the cadence of new properties like Anthem or anything coming out of Motive will be. That's still to be determined. But I think we're pretty comfortable. We believe it creates a nice top line growth that's all organic from our teams. And we're very focused on making sure that it's very profitable along the way. So we want to continue to drive both the top line and the bottom line through new IP, existing IP, new live services and margin expansion across all of those.

產品永遠不嫌多。我認為我們喜歡規律的節奏。我認為我們已經找到了一個很好的節奏，無論是《戰地》系列還是《星際大戰：前線》系列。我們正在努力確保充分利用我們與迪士尼在《星際大戰》系列電影上的關係，盡可能地與他們的戲院上映計畫保持一致。所以目前我們的計畫就是保持節奏不變。顯然，我們目前還不知道像《聖歌》這樣的新遊戲，或者 Motive 出品的任何新遊戲，其發布節奏會是怎樣的。這一點尚待確定。但我認為我們感覺挺舒服的。我們相信這將帶來良好的營收成長，而且這種成長完全來自我們團隊的自然成長。我們非常注重確保它在過程中獲得豐厚的利潤。因此，我們希望透過新的IP、現有的IP、新的上線服務以及所有這些方面的利潤率提升，繼續推動營收和利潤的成長。

Your next question comes from the line of Justin Post with Bank of America.

你的下一個問題來自美國銀行的賈斯汀·波斯特。

Two questions. First, obviously, you're excited about the improvements in Madden. How have you factored that into your guidance for both the upcoming quarter and maybe in the holiday season? And then second, Battlefield 1, looks like you're pretty excited about some changes there. Can you keep monetizing the digital after the year anniversary? Meaning, can you still see some pretty good digital revenues in fiscal '19 for that game?

兩個問題。首先，很顯然，你對 Madden 的改進感到興奮。您是如何將這些因素納入您對下一季以及假期季節的業績預期中的？其次，《戰地1》看起來你對它的一些變化感到非常興奮。週年紀念日過後，你還能繼續透過數位管道獲利嗎？也就是說，你認為這款遊戲在 2019 財年還能獲得相當不錯的數位收入嗎？

Yes. So we are planning for Madden to be up year-over-year, but I would say that it's not up dramatically, i.e., creating a risk in any way. You know Justin our approach to guidance. We try to be pretty rational and conservative. We think there's some upside to our guidance number there, but I wouldn't expect that it's up dramatically, creating any risk. Based on what we've seen of the game and the excitement around the esports mode is very, very positive. And so we're looking forward to a great Madden year ahead. In terms of Battlefield 1, we've had such great engagement there that we're continuing to feed new content into that community to try to continue to drive the game. We're constantly reminded that people are still playing Battlefield 4, for example. And that's a game that was -- it's almost 4 years old. And so to try to be able to continue to add things for people to stay engaged and to build off that economically is a big positive for us, and we see that as one of the efforts as to why we're pushing Battlefield 1. And then as a reminder, Andrew mentioned that at Gamescom in a few weeks, we're going to introduce a new esports mode to Battlefield. People have used Battlefield as an esports product for many years outside of EA. It's a fun, fast-paced game, but with a 64-player multiplayer, it's a bit hectic and chaotic for esports. And so you'll see some new modes coming out that will benefit a more rational esports approach and pretty exciting for us for this year and really powering next year and the year after off of that title.

是的。所以我們預期 Madden 的銷售量會逐年成長，但我認為成長幅度不會很大，也就是說，不會造成任何風險。賈斯汀，你知道我們指導學生的方式。我們盡量保持理性保守的態度。我們認為我們的業績指引數字還有一些上行空間，但我預期不會大幅上調，不會造成任何風險。根據我們目前對這款遊戲的了解以及玩家對電競模式的熱情來看，情況非常非常樂觀。因此，我們期待著下一個精彩的 Madden 賽季。就《戰地1》而言，我們獲得了非常積極的玩家參與，因此我們將繼續為該社群注入新的內容，以努力繼續推動遊戲的發展。我們常聽到這樣的說法：仍然有人在玩《戰地4》。那是一款已經有近 4 年歷史的遊戲。因此，我們努力不斷增加新內容，以保持玩家的參與度，並在此基礎上實現經濟成長，這對我們來說是一個巨大的利好，這也是我們大力推廣《戰地1》的原因之一。另外，安德魯也提到，在幾週後的科隆遊戲展上，我們將為《戰地風雲》系列推出全新的電競模式。多年來，除了 EA 之外，人們一直將《戰地》系列作為電競產品使用。這是一款有趣、節奏很快的遊戲，但對於電子競技來說，64 人多人遊戲模式有點混亂和嘈雜。因此，你會看到一些新的模式推出，這將有利於更理性的電子競技方法，這對我們來說非常令人興奮，而且將真正推動明年和後年的發展。

Your next question comes from the line of Brian Nowak with Morgan Stanley.

你的下一個問題來自摩根士丹利的布萊恩諾瓦克。

This is Jon Lanterman on for Brian. In the past, you guys had stated a goal of getting the percentage of games bought via digital download to 40%, 45%. And more recently, you've kind of updated this to 50% to 60-plus percent. Last year, we saw the traditional kind of 5% annual mix shift accelerate closer to 10%. So looking ahead, kind of what are some of the barriers that you guys see, the main barriers in getting to that 60-plus percent of games being downloaded?

這裡是 Jon Lanterman 替 Brian 報道。過去，你們曾提出一個目標，要將透過數位下載購買的遊戲比例提高到 40% 或 45%。而最近，你們已經將這個比例提高到了 50% 到 60% 以上。去年，我們看到傳統的 5% 的年度產品組合變化加速接近 10%。展望未來，你們認為要達到60%以上的遊戲下載率，主要障礙是什麼？

Yes, I think for us, the first and most important thing to remember is, we're very global. And so while there's high bandwidth speeds in the United States and in key major countries like the U.K. or France or Germany, that's not consistent all through Europe or Eastern Europe or Asia. And so that's probably still the biggest impediment to full game downloads. And the second piece is, while we in the U.S. and I think it's the same in Northern Europe and in some parts of Europe, the cashless credit or cashless transaction methods are fairly well-developed. I would say they're not as well developed in other places in the world. So the use of credit cards, PayPal, any type of e-pay approach has still got a long ways to go. And I would say those 2 things are the biggest impediments to full game downloads. We know that the consumer, once they do a full game download, realizes how easy it is and how effective it is for managing their games. And so we don't see consumer resistance. It's really the resistance around bandwidth speed and ability to pay with a cashless method.

是的，我認為對我們來說，首先也是最重要的一點是，我們是一家非常全球化的公司。因此，雖然美國以及英國、法國或德國等主要國家的頻寬速度很高，但這種速度在整個歐洲、東歐或亞洲並不一致。所以這可能仍然是完整遊戲下載的最大障礙。第二點是，雖然在美國，而且我認為北歐和歐洲的一些地區也是如此，無現金信貸或無現金交易方式已經相當發達。我認為它們在世界其他地方的發展程度還不夠完善。因此，信用卡、PayPal 以及任何類型的電子支付方式的使用還有很長的路要走。我認為這兩件事是完整遊戲下載的最大障礙。我們知道，消費者一旦完成遊戲的完整下載，就會意識到管理遊戲是多麼容易和有效。因此，我們沒有看到消費者的抵制情緒。實際上，阻力主要體現在頻寬速度和無現金支付方式的使用。

And then would you say a consumer who downloads the game is also more likely to do MTX and DLC and things like that?

那麼，您認為下載遊戲的消費者也更有可能進行微交易、購買DLC之類的行為嗎？

Yes. In fact, I would say it's probably the opposite, which is, many consumers are doing, for example, Ultimate Team, but were still buying the game physically. And they're realizing how effective and easy it is to pay through a credit card method and thus they'll transition into a full game download. We'll continue to do things to help the consumer see the opportunity there and find a way to buy our products digitally. And at the same time, we'll continue to make sure that we have a strong presence in all of our retail partners so -- because we know it will be a mixed model for a long period of time.

是的。事實上，我認為情況可能恰恰相反，許多消費者雖然在玩終極球隊模式，但仍然購買實體版遊戲。他們意識到使用信用卡付款是多麼有效和方便，因此他們會轉而下載完整版遊戲。我們將繼續努力，幫助消費者發現其中的機會，並找到以數位化方式購買我們產品的方法。同時，我們將繼續確保在所有零售合作夥伴中保持強大的影響力，因為我們知道在很長一段時間內，這將是一種混合模式。

Your next question comes from the line of Colin Sebastian with Robert W. Baird.

你的下一個問題來自 Colin Sebastian 和 Robert W. Baird 的系列文章。

First on competitive gaming. I wonder if you could comment on expectations for monetization of competitions, in particular for Madden and FIFA. Or whether you still view these experiences as more about driving loyalty and community? And then maybe a bigger picture question on Frostbite, which I think, Andrew, you said is powering 12 titles in development and is often highlighted as a key factor in game quality. My question is whether this version of the engine remains cutting-edge, is being refreshed sort of on an ongoing basis or given some more frequent console platform refreshes now? Should we expect a new version of Frostbite on the horizon?

首先是競技遊戲。我想請您談談對比賽獲利模式的預期，特別是針對 Madden 和 FIFA 比賽的獲利模式。或者您仍然認為這些體驗更多的是為了增強忠誠度和社區凝聚力？然後，或許可以問一個關於寒霜引擎的更宏觀的問題。安德魯，我想你說過，寒霜引擎正在為 12 款正在開發的遊戲提供動力，並且經常被認為是遊戲品質的關鍵因素。我的問題是，這個版本的引擎是否仍然處於領先地位，是否會持續更新，或者現在是否會更頻繁地針對主機平台進行更新？我們是否可以期待Frostbite引擎的新版本即將到來？

Two really good questions. On esports, as we think about esports and we think about the monetization of esports, we think about it along some core vectors. The first vector to esports is you need a global community of players who are engaged in the game. And if we look at FIFA and we look at Battlefield and we look at Madden, we have many tens of millions of players in each of those franchises who are continually and consistently engaged. Then next, you need a competitive game structure. And what you've seen from us over the last 12 months is a real focus on ensuring that we have a strong, competitive game structure all the way from the very, very amateur leagues, through to kind of elite championships. The next thing you need is a way to kind of monetize the increased engagement that you get out of that structure that you've put into place. And what you heard from me earlier was that we saw a significant uplift in FIFA Ultimate Team revenue over the past year. And we believe a strong contributor to that is the competitive gaming modes that we've built into FIFA, which again were the precursor to many of the new competitive gaming modes we've built into Madden this year. And so we are hopeful to see ongoing growth and monetization in and around Madden Ultimate Team as well. And then, of course, once you've got these global communities engaged at a higher rate in a digital ecosystem and a competitive game structure, then that's a very compelling community when it comes to broadcast deals and sponsorship deals. And we're seeing that also accelerate at a faster rate than we had expected and are very pleasantly surprised by that. In all honesty, our focus isn't about generating huge numbers out of broadcast deals yet. It's really about increasing viewership and building a truly entertainment -- entertaining experience for our global audience, but we see opportunities for strong returns on those 2 vectors as well, broadcast and sponsorship over the coming years.

兩個非常好的問題。在電子競技領域，當我們思考電子競技以及電子競技的獲利模式時，我們會從一些核心方面來考慮。電子競技的首要要素是需要一個全球性的玩家群體，他們都積極參與遊戲。如果我們看看 FIFA、戰地和麥登橄欖球，就會發現每個系列都有數千萬玩家持續不斷地參與其中。接下來，你需要一個具有競爭力的遊戲結構。在過去的 12 個月裡，你們看到的是我們真正專注於確保我們擁有一個強大且具有競爭力的比賽體系，從非常業餘的聯賽到精英錦標賽，無一例外。接下來你需要的是一種將你透過建立這種結構而獲得的更高參與度變現的方法。正如我之前所說，過去一年 FIFA Ultimate Team 的營收顯著成長。我們認為，這很大程度上要歸功於我們在 FIFA 中內建的競技遊戲模式，而這些模式也為我們今年在 Madden 中內建的許多新的競技遊戲模式奠定了基礎。因此，我們也希望看到 Madden Ultimate Team 及其周邊領域能夠持續成長並獲利。當然，一旦這些全球社群以更高的頻率參與數位生態系統和競爭性遊戲結構中，那麼在廣播協議和贊助協議方面，這將是一個極具吸引力的社群。而且我們發現，這種趨勢的加速發展速度也超出了我們的預期，對此我們感到非常驚訝。說實話，我們目前的重點並不是透過廣播交易獲得巨額收益。關鍵在於提高收視率，為我們的全球觀眾打造真正的娛樂體驗，但我們也看到了未來幾年在廣播和贊助這兩個方面獲得豐厚回報的機會。

Before Andrew answers the question on Frostbite, what I would say is, we talk about our business in general around engagement because that's what we're focused on. But let me be really direct, you don't get 22% year-on-year growth in live services without the esports power that we've seen in our Ultimate Team business. And I challenge any other console player to demonstrate where they've seen revenue growth of that level driving -- coming from esports. It is very powerful for us and it will continue to be very powerful.

在 Andrew 回答關於 Frostbite 的問題之前，我想說的是，我們通常會圍繞用戶參與度來談論我們的業務，因為這是我們關注的重點。但讓我直說吧，如果沒有我們在 Ultimate Team 業務中看到的電子競技實力，即時服務不可能實現 22% 的年增長率。我挑戰其他任何主機遊戲玩家，讓他們拿出證據來，證明他們在哪裡看到電子競技帶來如此巨大的收入成長。它對我們來說非常強大，而且將來也會一直非常強大。

On Frostbite, again, we have a very large team across a number of different locations who are constantly and continually investing and innovating in that engine in terms of visual fidelity, in terms of physics, in terms of animation, in terms of AI, every aspect that a game team needs to develop the most innovative and creative experiences. And when you look at what we've been able to do with Real Player Technology in FIFA this year, when you look at what we've been able to do with Madden visual fidelity and Madden cinematics and Longshot, the story mode, when you look at the expansive, dynamic worlds that we're showing in Star Wars Battlefront II, that is really demonstrative of the level of innovation and advancement we continue to make in that engine. And at some level, because we have a dozen teams building on top of the platform and a core team feeding all of that development back into the mainline of code, that engine is actually making leaps and bounds faster than many engines would, which is 1 or 2 games working on them. And so we are very, very happy with our core strategy of moving to a single engine. We're starting to see real leverage in the engine, not just in terms of our ability to build wonderfully large and creative and entertaining new games efficiently, but because we're able to do things that are far more innovative than things we're seeing anywhere else in the industry.

同樣，在寒霜引擎方面，我們擁有一支分佈在多個不同地點的龐大團隊，他們不斷地對該引擎進行投資和創新，包括視覺保真度、物理效果、動畫、人工智慧等各個方面，這些都是遊戲團隊開發最具創新性和創造性的遊戲體驗所必需的。當你看到我們今年在 FIFA 中利用真實球員技術所取得的成就，當你看到我們在《星球大戰：前線 II》中展示的廣闊、動態的世界時，這真正體現了我們在該引擎中不斷取得的創新和進步水平。從某種程度上來說，因為我們有十幾個團隊在這個平台上進行開發，還有一個核心團隊將所有這些開發成果反饋到主代碼中，所以這個引擎的開發速度實際上比很多引擎快得多，而很多引擎可能只有一兩個遊戲在開發。因此，我們對轉向單一引擎的核心策略非常滿意。我們開始看到引擎的真正優勢，不僅體現在我們能夠高效地構建精彩紛呈、創意十足、引人入勝的新遊戲，還體現在我們能夠做出比業內其他任何地方都更具創新性的事情。

Your next question comes from the line of Drew Crum with Stifel.

你的下一個問題來自 Drew Crum 與 Stifel 的合作系列。

So you have a very large installed base it seems for FIFA Mobile. Can you comment on the monetization trends that you're seeing? I think you mentioned, Blake, that June was your best month thus far. What changes have been made to drive the improved performance? And maybe comment on how it's performing relative to Madden NFL Mobile.

看來FIFA Mobile的用戶基數非常大。您能否談談您觀察到的獲利趨勢？布萊克，我想你之前說過，六月是你目前為止表現最好的一個月。為了提升性能，都做了哪些改變？或許還可以評論一下它相對於 Madden NFL Mobile 的表現如何。

So a great question. Again, when we launched FIFA, we were using the blueprint that we had used and developed over a 3-year period for Madden NFL in mobile that had really started to gain traction and continues to be a very engaging property for us. And when we did launch that, we said that even though we're using the blueprint for Madden, we expect that given the nature of the global community and the different geographic and cultural differences around both engagement and monetization in the soccer audience versus the North American-focused Madden audience, that we believed there would be some tuning time required. What the team has been doing on a day-to-day, week-to-week, month-to-month basis since launch is really better understanding through the great deal of data that we are able to get every day from play what cultural needs are, what engagement needs are, and ultimately, what the overall monetization needs are of each player base in each community. What we're seeing now, again, is the ongoing commitment to live services, events that are relevant to each of those communities around the globe starting to generate the kind of engagement and monetization growth that we would expect and continue to expect. I think that we are ahead of where we were with Madden. I don't have the exact data. We're ahead of where we were with Madden. And again, when you think about Madden as in a $50 million to $100 million range being primarily North American-focused, we continue to believe that FIFA on mobile can be substantially greater than that on a global basis.

這是一個很好的問題。同樣，當我們推出 FIFA 時，我們沿用了過去 3 年在行動端 Madden NFL 遊戲開發中使用的藍圖，該藍圖當時已經開始獲得廣泛關注，並且至今仍然是我們非常看重的遊戲。當我們推出這款遊戲時，我們曾表示，儘管我們採用了 Madden 的藍圖，但考慮到全球社區的性質，以及足球觀眾與以北美為中心的 Madden 觀眾在參與度和盈利方式方面存在的地域和文化差異，我們認為需要一些調整時間。自遊戲上線以來，團隊每天、每週、每月都在努力透過我們每天從遊戲中獲得的大量數據，以更好地了解每個社群中每個玩家群體的文化需求、參與需求以及最終的整體獲利需求。我們現在再次看到的是，對即時服務和與全球各個社區相關的活動的持續投入，開始產生我們預期並將繼續預期的那種參與度和盈利增長。我認為我們現在比之前玩《麥登橄欖球》的時候進步了很多。我沒有確切的數據。我們現在的進度比之前玩《麥登橄欖球》的時候快多了。再說，考慮到 Madden 遊戲主要面向北美市場，其投資額在 5,000 萬至 1 億美元之間，我們仍然相信，FIFA 行動版在全球範圍內的投資額可以遠遠超過這個數字。

Yes. And Drew, a couple of examples that just occurred during the quarter is, as I mentioned, they had 10 major new content updates. One, for example, is called VS Attack Mode, where players compete for leaderboard status and can unlock or upgrade items based on the division that they're in. It's proven to be very popular with the community and highly engaging. And think about this as, when we started FIFA Ultimate Team years ago, it was really one mode. And over time, it's developed into many different modes and many ways to play, and with many different types of players. And the journey of Madden Mobile followed that. FIFA Mobile will follow a similar journey over time. The quarter did really well, but it's a strong -- it wasn't a strong quarter for American football, but it's a strong quarter for international soccer. And so you tend to see strength in both FIFA and NBA in that quarter, but also you're seeing just the potential as we continue to add and work with the game. It's a game unlike most mobile games. It's more like our Madden or our FIFA or Madden Ultimate Team, where we've tinkered, we've played with it, and we've added to it over many years. And that's how we'll continue to grow both FIFA and NBA and Madden over time, and we're pretty excited about that.

是的。德魯，舉幾個例子來說，正如我之前提到的，本季他們進行了 10 次重大的新內容更新。例如，其中一種模式稱為 VS 攻擊模式，玩家可以在其中爭奪排行榜地位，並根據自己所在的關卡解鎖或升級物品。事實證明，它深受社區歡迎，且參與度很高。想想看，幾年前我們才剛推出 FIFA Ultimate Team 的時候，它其實只有一個模式。隨著時間的推移，它發展了許多不同的模式和玩法，吸引了許多不同類型的玩家。Madden Mobile 的發展歷程也緊隨其後。FIFA Mobile 的發展歷程也將隨著時間的推移而類似。本季表現非常出色，但對於美國橄欖球來說，這並非一個強勁的季度，但對於國際足球來說，這卻是一個強勁的季度。因此，你會發現 FIFA 和 NBA 在這一季度都表現出色，但隨著我們不斷添加和完善遊戲，你也會看到它們的巨大潛力。這是一款與大多數手機遊戲不同的遊戲。它更像是我們的《麥登橄欖球》、《FIFA》或《麥登終極球隊》，多年來我們不斷地調整、嘗試和添加內容。這就是我們未來發展 FIFA、NBA 和 Madden 系列遊戲的方式，我們對此感到非常興奮。

And your next question comes from the line of Andrew Uerkwitz with Oppenheimer.

你的下一個問題來自安德魯·烏爾克維茨和奧本海默的系列文章。

I just have 2 kind of higher-level questions. The first one is Battlefield 1, Titanfall 2 and a couple other games were added recently to EA Access. It feels a little bit like they were added a little bit earlier. Could you talk a little bit about the strategy around EA Access and potentially eventually an over-the-top gaming service? And then secondly and shifting gears on Frostbite, as that becomes more and more powerful, do you see opportunities beyond -- to use that game engine beyond traditional gaming?

我只有兩個比較高階的問題。第一款是《戰地1》，《泰坦隕落2》以及其他幾款遊戲最近也加入了EA Access。感覺像是稍微早一點添加的。您能否談談 EA Access 的策略，以及最終可能推出的 OTT 遊戲服務？其次，隨著 Frostbite 引擎變得越來越強大，您是否看到了將其應用於傳統遊戲之外的其他領域的機會？

Two great questions. As we think about subscription and less about the timing of adding of those particular titles to our EA Access subscription, but as we think about media consumption over the last 5 years, the greatest disruptor has been the combination of streaming and subscription. It's changed the way we watch television. It's changed the way we listen to music. It's changed how we think about ownership versus access. And we believe that ultimately, the combination of streaming plus subscription will also be a great disruptor to our business. And you've seen us investing there for a number of years. It's some years ago that we started our first streaming test. We continue those tests. We continue to work with other key large-scale partners on how we think streaming might work for our business in the future. You saw us launch EA Access and Origin Access. You should expect us to continue to push in growing the opportunities in and around subscription and delivering more value for our players on both of those vectors. As it relates to Frostbite, again, we had this wonderfully powerful engine that can do things that no other engine can do. And as you might imagine in our strategic planning meetings, often, we are sitting down and saying, okay, we have a great many strengths as a company, whether that's our nearly half -- people in our network, whether that's our social reach, whether that's the depth and breadth of our portfolio, whether that's our engine or our core digital platform with ID, infrastructure security, data, scalability. And we're always looking at how we might apply those to adjacent businesses or other areas that might deliver value, both to our players and to our shareholders. And Frostbite absolutely is front and center in those conversations.

兩個很好的問題。當我們思考訂閱模式，而不是何時將這些特定遊戲添加到我們的 EA Access 訂閱中時，當我們回顧過去 5 年的媒體消費時，最大的顛覆者是串流媒體和訂閱的結合。它改變了我們看電視的方式。它改變了我們聽音樂的方式。它改變了我們對所有權與使用權的看法。我們相信，最終串流媒體加訂閱的結合也將對我們的業務產生巨大的顛覆性影響。多年來，你們也看到了我們在那裡的投資。幾年前，我們開始了第一次串流媒體測試。我們將繼續進行這些測試。我們將繼續與其他重要的大型合作夥伴共同探討串流媒體在未來如何為我們的業務帶來益處。您已經見證了我們推出 EA Access 和 Origin Access。你們可以期待我們繼續努力拓展訂閱服務及相關領域的機遇，並在這兩個方面為我們的玩家創造更多價值。至於 Frostbite 引擎，我們再次擁有了這款強大的引擎，它可以做到其他引擎無法做到的事情。正如你可能想像的那樣，在我們的戰略規劃會議上，我們經常坐下來，說，好吧，我們公司有很多優勢，無論是我們網絡中近一半的人，還是我們的社交影響力，還是我們產品組合的深度和廣度，還是我們的引擎或核心數位平台，包括身份識別、基礎設施安全、數據和可擴展性。我們一直在思考如何將這些經驗應用到鄰近業務或其他領域，為我們的玩家和股東創造價值。而Frostbite絕對是這些討論的核心。

And just one clarification. We've announced that we will release Titanfall and Battlefield 1 in September. And that's about the normal cadence. We're typically somewhere between 7 and 9 months after initial -- of putting the title out. And so those really aren't any earlier than what we would normally see. But what we do see is, the more titles we have, the greater interest there is in the subscription. I think that makes common sense. But the more exciting titles like a Titanfall or a Battlefield 1, it also drives a huge amount of interest in the subscription service, and we tend to see nice pops around those announcements.

還有一點需要澄清。我們宣布將於9月發布《泰坦隕落》和《戰地1》。這就是正常的節奏。通常情況下，從發布標題到最終定稿，需要 7 到 9 個月的時間。所以，這些其實並不比我們平常看到的還要早。但我們看到的是，我們擁有的書籍越多，人們對訂閱的興趣就越大。我認為這符合常理。但像《泰坦隕落》或《戰地1》這樣更令人興奮的遊戲，也會極大地激發人們對訂閱服務的興趣，我們往往會在這些遊戲發布前後看到訂閱量大幅增長。

Your next question comes from the line of Eric Handler with MKM Partners.

你的下一個問題來自 MKM Partners 的 Eric Handler。

I'm just curious with -- we'll keep on the FIFA theme. You're now about 11 months away from the 2018 World Cup. How are you thinking about live services as you sort of get the lead-up to that event with -- you've got qualifying events. You've got the actual event itself. How you can sort of parlay that to sort of a side-by-side type of situation? And then secondly for Blake. So it looks like on your operating expense number guidance for 2Q, it looks like the non-GAAP, if we're allowed to say non-GAAP, number looks to be about $575 million. Should that be the peak of the year for operating expenses?

我只是好奇──我們就繼續聊FIFA這個話題吧。距離2018年世界盃還有大約11個月。您是如何考慮直播服務的？因為在舉辦活動之前，您已經舉辦了資格賽。你已經看到了事件本身。如何將這種情況轉化為並列比較的局面？其次是布萊克。所以，根據你們對第二季營運費用的預期，如果允許使用非GAAP準則的話，非GAAP準則下的費用數字似乎約為5.75億美元。這是否意味著全年營運費用將達到高峰？

Well, why don't I hit that one first, then I'll let Andrew hit the FIFA one. It's a very nice way of trying to get me -- have me give you third quarter and fourth quarter guidance early. But I can't say that, other than to say that if you've been using historical patterns for marketing spend, you should start to think about those differently over time. Because as we said, as we live in a live service world and as we have a bigger and bigger mobile business, we're driving and managing our business daily, not by title specifically or title launch specifically. And so what you're going to see is our marketing spend smooth out more across the year, but still be dominated by Q2 and Q3 because that's when our biggest properties come out. But we started spending on FIFA months ago or on Madden months ago. We're starting spending on Star Wars, for example, that doesn't come out until November versus the old model where the bulk of your spending came 3 weeks before you or 4 weeks before you ship the product, more like a movie. And we're moving to a much more ROI-driven marketing structure, where when we see something that works, we continue to fuel it. And we're driving more and more of our marketing in nontraditional ways, away from traditional media and into the more influencers of the world to try to drive the message home. And because of that, you're going to see different patterns in marketing spend. But I do -- I reiterate to everybody, our total marketing budget for the full year has not changed. And the targets that we've talked about relative to marketing have not changed. It's simply the spend patterns are slightly higher in this quarter than they have been historically, and that's probably why most people's models were off.

那不如我先玩那個，然後再讓安德魯玩FIFA那個。這是想讓我提前給出第三季和第四季業績預測的一個非常巧妙的辦法。但我不能妄下斷言，只能說，如果你一直以來都按照歷史模式來製定行銷支出計劃，那麼隨著時間的推移，你應該開始以不同的方式思考這些問題。因為正如我們所說，我們生活在一個即時服務的世界裡，而且我們的行動業務越來越大，我們每天都在推動和管理我們的業務，而不是具體到某個遊戲或某個遊戲的發布。因此，你會看到我們的行銷支出在全年更加平穩，但仍然會以第二季和第三季為主，因為那是我們最重要的專案推出的時期。但我們幾個月前就開始在FIFA或Madden遊戲上花錢了。例如，我們現在開始為《星際大戰》系列電影投入資金，而該系列電影要到 11 月才會上映。這與舊模式不同，舊模式下，大部分資金會在產品發貨前 3 週或 4 週投入，更像是為一部電影投入資金。我們正在轉向以投資報酬率為導向的行銷結構，一旦發現某種行銷方式有效，我們就會繼續加大投入。我們正越來越多地採用非傳統方式進行行銷，遠離傳統媒體，轉向世界各地更有影響力的人士，以期能更好地傳遞訊息。正因為如此，你會看到行銷支出方面出現不同的模式。但我確實要向所有人重申，我們全年的行銷預算總額沒有改變。我們之前討論過的與行銷相關的目標並沒有改變。本季的消費模式略高於歷史水平，這可能是大多數人的模型出現偏差的原因。

On World Cup, again, as you can imagine, we -- there's always a great deal of excitement around the World Cup. It's the world's largest sporting event. And typically, represents a great opportunity for us and our FIFA player community. We got a long history of bringing that event to life for our fan base, dating all the way back to World Cup '98. So no new announcements on that yet. But as the event gets closer in 2018, we're going to detail a lot more of how we're thinking about bringing the event to life for our global FIFA community.

說到世界杯，正如你所想，世界杯總是能引起人們極大的興奮。這是世界上最大的體育賽事。通常來說，這對我們和我們的 FIFA 玩家群來說都是一個絕佳的機會。我們一直以來都致力於為我們的粉絲群重現這一盛事，這可以追溯到 1998 年世界盃。所以目前還沒有關於這方面的新消息。但隨著 2018 年賽事的臨近，我們將詳細介紹我們如何考慮為全球 FIFA 社群帶來這場盛事。

Your next question comes from the line of San Phan with Mizuho.

你的下一個問題來自 San Phan 與瑞穗銀行的合作系列。

I was wondering, can you tease out what you mentioned earlier on the step-up in OpEx maybe on the R&D side with the new genres. And perhaps how much of the increase is more a timing issue versus a higher run rate for R&D?

我想問一下，您能否詳細解釋一下您之前提到的關於營運支出提升，以及在新領域中研發方面的進展？或許，成長的多少是時機問題，還是研發投入成長加速的問題？

So we will have a slightly higher run rate for R&D. We're building out a new studio in Montréal, as we've told everyone. And we've hired over 100 people into that studio that are brand-new to EA. This is to build the new IP around Jade Raymond's team that she's been building. I was in that studio last month. And it's a wonderful new addition to our team. And we brought our BioWare Montréal team into that same facility. So they now all sit in one new studio together. We're obviously investing in Anthem, which everyone got a chance to see at E3. That's out of the BioWare Edmonton team and are very excited -- they're very excited. We'll see some increases around that in terms of spending. And then we're continuing to invest across all of our network and platform activities. I don't see any of those going beyond the targets that we've talked about, trying to keep R&D expense in the 21% to 22% of revenue range, but it is -- the goal is to drive new revenue. And if for some reason we weren't able to drive new revenue, clearly, that would be overspending, but we're very confident that we can drive new revenue around the action genre and continuing live service build-out across all of our products.

因此，我們的研發投入將會略微增加。正如我們告訴大家的那樣，我們正在蒙特利爾建造一個新的工作室。我們已經為工作室招募了 100 多名 EA 新員工。這是為了圍繞 Jade Raymond 一直在組建的團隊打造新的智慧財產權。我上個月去過那個錄音室。這是我們的團隊的一大助力。我們將 BioWare Montréal 團隊也遷入了同一辦公室。所以現在他們都在一個新的工作室裡一起工作。我們顯然在投資《聖歌》，大家都在 E3 遊戲展上看到了這款遊戲。這是來自 BioWare 埃德蒙頓團隊的消息，他們非常興奮——他們真的非常興奮。預計支出方面會有一些成長。然後，我們將繼續增加對所有網路和平台活動的投入。我不認為這些目標會超出我們討論過的目標，即努力將研發費用控制在收入的 21% 到 22% 的範圍內，但目標是推動新的收入成長。如果由於某種原因我們無法創造新的收入，那顯然就是過度支出，但我們非常有信心能夠圍繞動作遊戲類型創造新的收入，並繼續在我們所有產品中建立即時服務。

Your next question comes from the line of Mike Hickey with Benchmark Company.

你的下一個問題來自 Benchmark 公司的 Mike Hickey。

Just a quick one, I guess, on Battlefront II. Obviously, you guys have done a lot of work with the first version. I think, Andrew, you said that for the YouTube videos your views was up over the original, but do you have any specific data at this point that would suggest that this game could outsell Battlefront I? And then just to confirm, I think you have said before you're looking for 14 million units within your guidance. I don't know if that's correct or not. Any thoughts there would be helpful.

我只想簡單說說《星際大戰：前線2》。顯然，你們在第一版上投入了大量精力。安德魯，我想你說過你的 YouTube 影片的觀看次數比原版有所增加，但你目前有任何具體數據表明這款遊戲的銷量可能會超過《星際大戰：前線 I》嗎？然後我再確認一下，我想您之前說過，您的目標銷售量是 1400 萬套。我不知道這樣說是否正確。任何想法都將不勝感激。

Mike, just -- I'll let Andrew answer, but you broke in and out a little bit on the last. I think were you saying, are you changing your 14 million unit number for guidance? Is that what you asked?

麥克，就——我讓安德魯來回答吧，不過你剛才說話斷斷續續的。我想你的意思是，你們會修改1400萬輛的指導數字嗎？這就是你問的嗎？

No, I wasn't getting there yet. I may have gotten there, but I just wanted to clarify that was the number, Blake?

不，我還沒到那裡。我可能已經到了，但我只是想確認一下，布萊克，那是那個號碼嗎？

Yes, that was and still is the number, but I'll let Andrew talk a little bit about the demand generation and how the product is shaping up.

是的，過去是、現在仍然是這個數字，但我會讓安德魯談談需求產生情況以及產品的發展。

Yes, thanks, Mike. If anyone got to see the title in and around EA PLAY or at E3 in Sony's booth, the title is coming together really, really strong. The sentiment is really strong. The single-player campaign is resonating really, really well with the community as well as the depth and breadth expansion in multiplayer. The video views are up significantly, as I talked about in the prepared notes. We have not changed our unit expectation on that at this point, but we're very, very happy with the progress in the game and very energized by the positive feedback we're receiving from the community.

好的，謝謝你，麥克。如果有人在 EA PLAY 或 E3 索尼展位上見過這款遊戲，你會發現它真的非常非常出色。這種情緒非常強烈。單人戰役模式以及多人遊戲模式的深度和廣度擴展都受到了玩家社群的熱烈歡迎。正如我在準備的筆記中提到的那樣，影片觀看次數顯著增加。目前我們還沒有改變對這方面的預期，但我們對遊戲的進展非常非常滿意，從社群收到的正面回饋也讓我們倍受鼓舞。

Yes, and Disney has been a great partner for us. They had our lead protagonist on the stage with characters from the Star Wars movie at their D23 celebration last month. And we're very excited about continuing to leverage the upcoming movie as well as the buzz that's generated around Star Wars. And so more to come. I think we're trying to be careful that we don't get ahead of ourselves on unit forecast. And as I said earlier, it's still really early in the year so.

是的，迪士尼一直是我們非常棒的合作夥伴。上個月的D23慶祝活動上，他們讓我們的主角與《星際大戰》電影中的角色一起登台亮相。我們非常高興能夠繼續利用即將上映的電影以及《星際大戰》所引發的熱潮。敬請期待更多精彩內容。我認為我們正在努力謹慎行事，避免在單位預測方面操之過急。正如我之前所說，現在還只是年初。

That's fair enough. Just one quick one, another one for me. I was hopeful that you could sort of walk us through the competitive setup. This holiday, obviously, not a holiday release, but Destiny is coming out fairly soon in September. And then you have Call of Duty that's sort of a boots on the ground similar to play experience you had with Battlefield 1. I have Battlegrounds on Xbox, which obviously is catching a lot of buzz and all those boots on the ground. So just curious how you think all these 4 titles will play out and maybe the opportunity or threat they could create for you.

這很合理。就快點，我再來一個。我原本希望您能為我們講解一下比賽的設定。顯然，這次假期發售的不是假日限製版，但《命運》將於9月很快發售。然後還有《決勝時刻》，它有點像《戰地1》一樣，提供身臨其境的戰鬥體驗。我在Xbox上玩《絕地求生》，這款遊戲顯然引起了廣泛關注，也提供了這種身臨其境的戰鬥體驗。所以，我很好奇你認為這四款遊戲最終會如何發展，以及它們可能會為你帶來哪些機會或威脅。

Well, you have Assassin's as well, don't you just throw more fuel on your fire. I guess the difference is, we've got boots in space versus boots on the ground. So what we found historically, we've had many times where we've gone into quarters that are -- look daunting because of the competition. Think back to GTA when it came out. And what we've actually found is it grows the overall market. It drives console sales. Oftentimes, many of those titles get bundled to help drive or reduce the price of a console for the consumer and it drives excitement in the marketplace. And we like that. It benefits the consumer and it benefits us because it generates a lot of buzz around games. We've always competed against most of those titles you mentioned or all those titles you mentioned. And so I don't think it bothers us, but it excites us, I'd say, instead. And remember, no Red Dead that was originally in the plans for the fourth -- or the third -- our third quarter, fourth quarter in the calendar year. So that does open up a little bit of opportunity, I think, for everybody.

你也有刺客，難道你不是在火上加油嗎？我想差別在於，我們有太空部隊，而有地面部隊。因此，從歷史經驗來看，我們多次進入一些地區，這些地區由於競爭激烈而顯得令人生畏。回想一下GTA剛推出的時候。而我們實際發現的是，它促進了整體市場的成長。它能促進遊戲機的銷售。通常情況下，許多遊戲會捆綁銷售，以幫助降低遊戲機的價格，從而刺激市場。我們喜歡這樣。這既有利於消費者，也有利於我們，因為它能為遊戲帶來許多話題性。我們一直都在和您提到的那些遊戲或賽事競爭，或者說，我們一直都在和您提到的所有遊戲或賽事競爭。所以我覺得這不但不會困擾我們，反而會讓我們感到興奮。請記住，原計劃在第四季（或第三季）——也就是日曆年的第三季和第四季——推出的《荒野大鏢客》遊戲並不存在。所以我認為這確實為每個人帶來了一些機會。

Your next question comes from the line of Laura Martin with Needham.

你的下一個問題來自 Laura Martin 與 Needham 的對話。

So I guess I have 3 like little ones. So I'm wondering if you've seen player engagement fall on Madden as a reflection of the weakness in NFL TV ratings or have you seen those things be disconnected? That's my first one. My second one is, so philosophically, marketing, I would have guessed that marketing expense in your mind was more of a substitute for your license fees because to your point, you do have soccer starting or football starting or you're going to have Star Wars released. To me, those feel like marketing, I don't know, marketing turnaround that should cut your marketing fees -- expenses. So I'm wondering how you think about license fees as a substitute for marketing or do you not think of it that way. And then I'd love your update on VR/AR and where do you think its place is in future games.

所以我想我有三個像小孩子一樣的孩子。所以我想知道，你是否觀察到玩家在 Madden 遊戲中的參與度下降反映了 NFL 電視收視率的疲軟，還是你認為這兩者之間沒有關聯？這是我的第一個。我的第二個問題是，從哲學角度來說，就是行銷。我原本以為，在你看來，行銷費用更像是授權費的替代品，因為正如你所說，你的確有足球比賽或橄欖球比賽即將開始，或者你即將上映《星際大戰》。在我看來，這些感覺像是行銷方面的，我不知道，行銷轉型，應該可以削減你的行銷費用——開支。所以我想知道您如何看待授權費作為行銷的替代品，或者您根本不這麼認為。然後我很想聽聽你對VR/AR的看法，以及你認為它在未來遊戲中會扮演什麼角色。

Why don't I have Andrew hit the first and the last question on VR and then the first question on the NFL?

為什麼我不讓安德魯回答虛擬實境（VR）的第一個和最後一個問題，然後再回答美國國家橄欖球聯盟（NFL）的第一個問題呢？

So I'll start with VR and AR. Not a lot of new news on VR for us. And as you said, there's not a lot of new news for VR in the industry. People seem to have come to terms with the fact that VR, while an unbelievably wonderful innovation for how you consume interactive entertainment and all forms of entertainment for that matter, is going to take a couple of years at least to kind of get to a point where it is truly a mass-market consumer opportunity. We still are in the same position we were in which we have enabled core VR capability in our Frostbite engine. We have delivered a console experience, in the process of delivering a mobile experience. And we'll continue to push on the boundaries of, what's a sports game look like inside of VR, what's a first-person shooter look like in VR, what's an action-adventure game look like in VR. And that's really at a design level and something that will start to manifest in the marketplace in the years to come. AR, I think, is more interesting. I think the notion of a data overlay into your mobile, console, PC games, something that takes things that are important and interesting about you, whether that's geo data or whether that's gameplay data or friends data that you are able to allow the game to utilize to enhance and extend your experience. I think we're likely to see more of that sooner. And certainly, our creative teams are really thinking about what kind of data would a player want to use from their real-world to augment their virtual. And you should expect to see more of that from us also in the coming months and years. As it relates to Madden, again, what you might also recall as well, there was a lot of articles in the early part of the season around slower TV ratings around football. Post-November, the ratings were actually very strong and ultimately end up with one of the most exciting Super Bowls in recent history. And again, Tom Brady, who was the chief architect of that excitement, is on the cover of our Madden game this year. So we're very happy to have him. In terms of engagement for us, what we actually saw was more engagement in our Madden game and more engagement in Madden Ultimate Team. And so we feel very good about that. We believe we are introducing, engaging and onboarding a new and young audience to football fandom and are excited by what we're going to do this year with Madden on Frostbite, with Longshot and the many developments and innovations that come with it.

那我就先從VR和AR說起。關於VR領域，我們這邊並沒有太多新消息。正如你所說，VR產業並沒有太多新消息。人們似乎已經接受了這樣一個事實：VR 雖然對於人們消費互動娛樂以及所有形式的娛樂來說都是一項令人難以置信的偉大創新，但至少還需要幾年時間才能真正成為大眾市場消費者的機會。我們目前仍處於與之前相同的狀態，即在寒霜引擎中啟用了核心VR功能。我們已經實現了主機遊戲體驗，同時也努力實現行動端體驗。我們將繼續突破界限，探索在 VR 中運動遊戲的畫面效果、在 VR 中第一人稱射擊遊戲的畫面效果、在 VR 中動作冒險遊戲的畫面效果。這實際上是在設計層面上的問題，並且將在未來幾年開始在市場上顯現出來。我認為擴增實境（AR）更有趣。我認為，將數據疊加到你的手機、主機、PC遊戲中，會收集一些對你來說重要且有趣的信息，比如地理位置數據、遊戲數據或好友數據，你可以允許遊戲利用這些信息來增強和擴展你的遊戲體驗。我認為我們很可能很快就會看到更多這樣的情況。當然，我們的創意團隊正在認真思考玩家希望使用現實世界中的哪些數據來增強他們的虛擬體驗。在接下來的幾個月和幾年裡，你們也應該會看到我們推出更多這樣的產品。至於 Madden，你可能也記得，賽季初期有很多文章報導了橄欖球比賽收視率下降的問題。11 月之後，收視率實際上非常強勁，最終成就了近年來最令人興奮的超級盃之一。再次，作為這股熱潮的主要創造者，湯姆·布雷迪今年登上了我們《麥登橄欖球》遊戲的封面。所以我們很高興能有他加入。就我們的用戶參與度而言，我們實際看到的是 Madden 遊戲和 Madden Ultimate Team 的參與度更高。所以，我們對此感到非常滿意。我們相信，我們正在向足球迷群體引入、吸引和培養新的年輕觀眾，並且對今年我們將在 Frostbite 引擎上推出的 Madden、Longshot 以及隨之而來的許多發展和創新感到興奮。

On the marketing question. We do try to offset our marketing expenses where we have royalties. So in our sports titles where we're paying a royalty, we try to leverage our partners, like FIFA or the NBA or the NFL to help us market as much as possible. And in some cases, we do a good job with that offset. In some cases, it's not fully offset. I'd say the thing to remember is, in Q2, we've got FIFA, Madden, NBA, NHL and The Sims 4 all coming out on console, plus we've got -- we continue to fuel all of our mobile titles during that same time frame and PC free-to-play titles. And so just simple alone, we didn't have NBA last year, we didn't have The Sims last year, so the both of those are going to be additive to the marketing expense in the quarter. But also, as I mentioned earlier, we're doing a lot of long lead time marketing for the third quarter titles like Need for Speed or Battlefront. And despite the partnerships that we have, those still take money to market or to make sure that we're spreading the word around the quality and the excitement of the game. And so the combination of where the titles fall and how the marketing has changed over time is how you're seeing some of the differences in OpEx.

關於市場行銷問題。我們會盡量用有版稅收入的管道來抵銷行銷費用。因此，在我們支付版稅的運動遊戲作品中，我們會努力利用我們的合作夥伴，例如 FIFA、NBA 或 NFL，來幫助我們盡可能地進行市場推廣。在某些情況下，我們利用這種偏移效果很好。在某些情況下，它並不能完全抵消。我想說的是，在第二季度，我們將有 FIFA、Madden、NBA、NHL 和《模擬市民 4》等遊戲登陸主機平台，此外，我們還將繼續推進所有行動遊戲和 PC 免費遊戲的開發。就這一點而言，我們去年沒有NBA，也沒有模擬市民，所以這兩項都會增加本季的行銷費用。但正如我之前提到的，我們正在為第三季的遊戲（如《極速快感》或《星際大戰：前線》）進行大量的提前行銷。儘管我們建立了合作關係，但這些仍然需要資金投入市場，以確保我們能夠宣傳遊戲的品質和精彩之處。因此，產品名稱的分佈以及行銷方式隨時間推移而發生的變化，共同導致了營運支出方面的一些差異。

Your next question comes from the line of Evan Wingren with KeyBanc Capital Markets.

你的下一個問題來自 KeyBanc Capital Markets 的 Evan Wingren。

You gave the Ultimate Team population was up 11% year-on-year. I wonder if you'd give us an update on the trends in terms of the number of payers and the magnitude of the payers and what the growth rates are as well there.

您提供的 Ultimate Team 玩家數量較去年同期增加了 11%。我想請您介紹一下支付方數量、支付方規模以及成長率等方面的趨勢。

Yes, I mean, without getting into too much numbers, what I can tell you is, the number of people that buy the game and then join Ultimate Team continues to go up. FIFA is the leader across all of our Ultimate Teams in that respect. And we believe the story mode last year helped drive much of that growth. So more people coming into Ultimate Team from the core game and more people starting to spend money realizing that it is very fun. And if they spend some money, it will even be more fun. And also the amount of dollars they spend are continuing to go up over time. As we add new ways to play and new content to play with, that gives them more things to spend money on over time. So it's a win-win across the board. It's more engagement, more enjoyment and more things to actually spend on, which is driving the success of all of the Ultimate Teams.

是的，我的意思是，雖然不涉及太多具體數字，但我可以告訴你的是，購買遊戲並加入終極球隊模式的人數持續增長。就這一點而言，FIFA 在我們所有的終極球隊模式中都是領先的。我們認為去年的故事模式對推動這一成長起到了很大的作用。因此，越來越多的人從核心遊戲轉戰終極球隊模式，越來越多的人開始花錢，因為他們意識到這非常有趣。如果他們花點錢，那就更有意思了。而且，他們的消費金額也隨著時間的推移而持續成長。隨著我們不斷增加新的玩法和新的遊戲內容，玩家隨著時間的推移就有了更多可以花錢的地方。所以這對各方來說都是雙贏。更多的參與、更多的樂趣以及更多可以實際消費的東西，正是推動所有終極球隊成功的因素。

Got it. And it looks like, if I did my math right, the gross margin expansion in 1Q was around 700 basis points and then in the 2Q the, I guess, sequential improvement in gross margins on a year-over-year basis is down a little bit. Is that just tied to higher royalty costs? Or is there something else going on that would prohibit more margin expansion?

知道了。如果我計算沒錯的話，第一季的毛利率擴張約為 700 個基點，而第二季度，毛利率較去年同期成長似乎略有下降。這只是因為版稅成本更高嗎？或者有其他因素阻礙利潤率的進一步擴張？

Yes, it's mainly tied to the fact that we have 4 sports titles that all have royalties to them in the quarter. And as those titles continue to be successful, that obviously impacts the gross margin, particularly in the second quarter. We'll get some offset with The Sims, but not enough to offset all of it. We also tend to have a fairly conservative forecast on digital because it's hard for us to guess exactly how fast the consumer will move to digital. So clearly, if more digital live services occur or more full game downloads occur, there could be some upside to that gross margin number.

是的，這主要是因為我們有 4 個體育類刊物，它們在這個季度都會收到版稅。隨著這些遊戲持續取得成功，這顯然會對毛利率產生影響，尤其是在第二季。我們可以玩《模擬市民》來彌補一些損失，但不足以完全彌補。我們對數位化領域的預測也往往比較保守，因為我們很難準確預測消費者向數位轉型的速度。因此很明顯，如果出現更多數位直播服務或更多完整遊戲下載，毛利率數字可能會上升。

And our final question comes from the line of Raymond Stochel with Consumer Edge Research.

最後一個問題來自 Consumer Edge Research 的 Raymond Stochel。

You guys have a big bucket of initiatives in cloud, streaming, AI, virtual human. So which initiative in that bucket would most likely to be financially impactful over the next 3 to 5 years? And then overall, how much are you spending on these initiatives as you are thinking long term about your business?

你們在雲端運算、串流媒體、人工智慧、虛擬人等領域有許多創新措施。那麼，在未來 3 到 5 年內，上述各項措施中哪一項最有可能產生經濟效益呢？那麼，從長遠角度考慮，您在這些舉措上總共投入了多少資金？

Again, there's a lot of things that we're investing in. And again, what we talked about in the prepared notes is we do believe there's going to be more change in the next 5 years in our industry than there has been the last 45. And we want to ensure that we are on the frontline of that transformation and disruption in our business. As we think about those things, we are very focused in our investment. We don't have hundreds and hundreds of people working on these types of projects. We are very calculated and targeted in how we invest and in terms of where we think the greatest return will come. For many of those things, we actually think the time horizon is about 5 years-plus. But things like cloud and streaming, we believe it's probably in the 2- to 5-year time frame. When we think about subscription, we're already seeing return from that. And the combination of that with streaming on that 2- to 5-year time horizon could be very meaningful in terms of revenue addition for us. And so as we think about the future, we're always going to have small squads thinking about new technology. And we think about it on, what are we building for this fiscal year? What are we building for the next 24 months? What are we building for the next 24 months to 5 years? And how are we thinking about 5 years-plus? And you should expect the 5 years-plus are very, very small, targeted teams. The 2 to 5 years are slightly bigger. And much of our investment is around delivering the next 24 months.

再次強調，我們正在投資很多項目。正如我們在準備的筆記中討論的那樣，我們相信未來 5 年我們行業的變化將比過去 45 年的變化更大。我們希望確保自己處於業務轉型和變革的最前線。考慮到這些因素，我們在投資方面非常專注。我們沒有成百上千的人從事這類計畫。我們在投資方面非常注重策略和目標，會仔細甄別，尋找我們認為回報最大的投資機會。對於許多這類事情，我們認為時間跨度其實在 5 年以上。但像是雲端運算和串流媒體這樣的技術，我們認為可能還需要 2 到 5 年的時間才能普及。當我們考慮訂閱模式時，我們已經看到了從中獲得的回報。而從 2 到 5 年的時間跨度來看，將串流媒體與此結合起來，可能會為我們帶來非常可觀的收入成長。因此，當我們思考未來時，我們總會有小團隊思考新技術。我們會思考，本財年要建造什麼？接下來24個月我們要建造什麼？我們未來24個月到5年要建造什麼？那麼，我們該如何看待五年甚至更長時間呢？你應該預料到，在這五年以上的時間裡，團隊規模都非常非常小，而且目標明確。2 至 5 年的時間稍長。我們的大部分投資都圍繞著未來 24 個月的交付。

Yes, and I think 2 things to note is, we started investing on the foundation to be able to have a streaming business or a subscription business 3 or 4 years ago. And much of our investment around cloud has gone on over the last couple of years. And we feel like we're in a very good position there. So don't assume it's all going to start some time now. Much of it's already baked in. And the second thing is, part of the change that we've tried to drive at EA is we ask a simple question, if we're going to invest in this, what are we going to stop investing in? We can't do everything. And the organization is very focused around that and very much positive when we ask that question and a way of trying to constantly reprioritize what's the most important thing to do today. And we think that will also help us manage that investment so we don't show up in the future with a big surprise.

是的，我認為有兩點需要注意：我們早在三、四年前就開始投資，為開展串流媒體業務或訂閱業務奠定基礎。過去幾年，我們在雲端運算領域的投資佔了很大比例。我們感覺我們在這方面處於非常有利的地位。所以不要以為這一切現在就會開始。很多事情已經既定了。第二點是，我們在 EA 努力推動的變革之一，就是我們提出一個簡單的問題：如果我們打算投資於此，那麼我們將停止投資於什麼？我們不可能面面俱到。組織非常重視這一點，當我們提出這個問題時，他們的回答也非常積極，並且會不斷重新確定今天最重要的事情的優先順序。我們認為這也有助於我們管理這項投資，以免將來出現令人大跌眼鏡的情況。

With that, we'll end the call. We'll talk to everyone next quarter. Thank you.

通話到此結束。下個季度我們會和所有人談談。謝謝。

Thanks so much.

非常感謝。

Thank you for your participation. This does conclude today's conference call, and you may now disconnect.

感謝您的參與。今天的電話會議到此結束，您可以斷開連線了。