Major game maker Konami Corp. said Thursday it posted strong earnings for the fiscal first half and more than doubled its midterm dividend.

Konami's group net profit for the six-month period through September came to 4.37 billion yen on revenue of 113.2 billion yen.

The company, which adopted U.S. accounting rules starting with the interim earnings report after listing on the New York Exchange on Sept. 30, did not give year-on-year performance comparisons because of accounting discrepancies.

However, according to the unconsolidated earnings report compiled under Japanese methods, net profit during the period soared 81.9 percent year-on-year to 3.91 billion yen, while sales grew 19.2 percent to 54.43 billion yen.

The firm attributed its robust performance to brisk sales of game software, which grew by 2.5 million units from a year ago to 8.5 million for the period.

In the domestic market, where 4.6 million units were sold, World Soccer Winning Eleven 6 sold 1.1 million copies after its release in April, thanks to the World Cup finals.

Overseas, card game and video game software products featuring Yu-Gi-Oh! enjoyed robust sales while its slot machine businesses in the U.S. and Australia saw solid growth.

The better-than-expected performance prompted the firm to raise its interim dividend to 19 yen per share from the 9 yen originally planned.

For the full year to next March, the firm projects a group net profit of 11.5 billion yen on revenue of 245 billion yen.

Regarding the merger of Square Co. and Enix Corp. announced Tuesday, Konami's executive corporate officer Toshiro Tateno indicated he wasn't worried because Konami is different from home video game makers in that its operations are more diversified.

"In a trend of rising consumer standards for game software and growing development costs, I think there are a variety of options (for game makers) to take," he said.