Seoul: NCSOFT Corp., a South Korean game developer, announced a return to net profit in the third quarter, primarily driven by a one-off factor. The company reported a net profit of 347.4 billion won (US$238.5 million) for the July-September period, a significant turnaround from a loss of 26.5 billion won in the same period last year, as per their regulatory filing.

According to Yonhap News Agency, the earnings surpassed market expectations, with analysts predicting an average net profit of 114.8 billion won, based on a survey by Yonhap Infomax, the financial data firm of Yonhap News Agency. The operating loss was reduced to 7.5 billion won from 14.3 billion won a year earlier. However, sales saw a decline of 10.4 percent, amounting to 360 billion won.

The company attributed the net profit surge to a one-off gain from selling its office building in southern Seoul. Despite the profit, sales from mobile game titles decreased by 22.2 percent year-on-year to 197.2 billion won, whereas sales from PC games increased by 9 percent to 87.7 billion won.

South Korea remained the largest market for NCSOFT, generating 217.8 billion won in sales. This was followed by the rest of Asia, contributing 67.5 billion won, and North America and Europe combined, with 28 billion won.

NCSOFT also announced plans to introduce a sequel to its popular role-playing game Aion at the annual gaming fair G-Star 2025, set to commence Thursday in Busan.