The games label behind the Worms and The Escapists reports 'strong sales traction' during lockdown

The latest trading update has been released to the stock exchange.

TEAM17, the label behind video games such as Worms and The Escapists, today said it had delivered 'strong sales traction' over the last half year despite the lockdown.

Team17 , which is a global games entertainment label, creative partner and developer of independent premium video games, has provided a trading update ahead of its results for the six months ended 30 June 2020.

The statement said: "The company has experienced strong sales traction during the period. This good performance has been delivered against the backdrop of the global COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown.

"During these unprecedented times the company has seen above expected demand for its back catalogue, which has outperformed pre C-19 expectations, especially at the height of the lock down during April and May."

"In addition, further sales traction and increased playtime was generated across our more socially orientated or multi-player co-op and online games, which has enhanced earnings specifically on key franchise titles such as Worms, Overcooked and The Escapists alongside 2019 new game IPs Golf with Your Friends, Hell Let Loose and the recently released Moving Out."

The company said it was extremely proud of how its teams seamlessly switched to remote working as various lockdowns were imposed globally.

The statement added: "Their performance has been terrific, and as a testament to how well the company has responded, we will not be seeking a speedy return to office-based working until we are certain it will be permanent and most importantly safe.

"Yippee Entertainment Limited, which was acquired in January 2020, is now fully integrated with the team 100% focused on Team17 games. In addition to Yippee actively recruiting as we seek to expand our second UK development studio location, we have also maintained our broader recruitment targets during the period.

"Our successful greenlight process has thrived during the lock-down period with new highly successful virtual gaming events being held to combat the loss of physical events such as the Game Developers Conference and others, and we now have more games in later stage discussion than at any other time in our history.

"We continue to increase the number of games viewed and assessed and can confirm that we have signed an additional seven new games in the first half of the year for release in future years. This includes for the first-time partners in Mexico and Russia which is testament to how respected our award-winning games label is for delivering excellent results for our label partners around the world."

The statement added: "Importantly, our development and commercial teams have successfully launched three new games during remote working with Moving Out and Golf with Your Friends (console) being released as planned in April and May respectively.

"Furthermore, on 11 June 2020, Main Assembly was launched into early access on Steam. We have continued to support our back catalogue portfolio with a number of paid and free downloadable content throughout the first half which shows the strengths of our lifecycle management, QA, development, production and marketing teams across an ever-growing portfolio of 300+ digital revenue lines."

Team17 said that despite the challenges generated by C-19 it was delighted with an excellent start to FY2020 "and, as previously announced, we have a solid pipeline of new releases weighted towards the second half of 2020".

"We have more games in development across our label than at any time in our history, including owned IP and are engaging with more partners seeking to have their games be part of our label and continue to see more new gamers playing our games and franchises during C-19."

The statement added: "Gaming has historically shown good resistance in uncertain economic situations; however, we are in unprecedented times. We have started to see the unusually high levels of demand during April and May returning to a more normal level. C-19 has proven the resilience of the business during this period, however, there clearly remains a degree of uncertainty as to the longevity and socio-economic effects of C-19 on our markets.