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Insomniac leak indirectly revealed sales of Xbox first-party games on PC

ManaByte

Gold Member
Sea of Thieves - 9,32 million
johnny depp love GIF


Funny how everyone downplays its success at every turn.

Best game Rare's ever made and they keep making it better.
 
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Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.

Not everyone on PC has GamePass.

I subscribe to GamePass Ultimate for my Xbox Series X and PC but will shortly be cancelling it as I find it has little of interest for me these days and I'd rather use the money to purchase the full games on Steam than have to endure the awful Xbox app on my PC that constantly breaks game installs with updates, something I never have a problem with on Steam.

And for the record, I bought Starfield and Forza Motorsport on Steam for my PC.
 
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SmokedMeat

Gamer™
Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.

For starters more people prefer buying games, otherwise subscriptions would be exploding at a crazy rate.

Then there’s the Steam factor, which is where the vast majority of PC gamers prefer to play. The Microsoft Store is garbage.

I also think Starfield was expected to be another Skyrim - which isn’t the type of game you rent and move on from.
 
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twilo99

Member
Not everyone on PC has GamePass.

I subscribe to GamePass Ultimate for my Xbox Series X and PC but will shortly be cancelling it as I find it has little of interest for me these days and I'd rather use the money to purchase the full games on Steam than have to endure the awful Xbox app on my PC that constantly breaks game installs with updates, something I never have a problem with on Steam.

And for the record, I bought Starfield and Forza Motorsport on Steam for my PC.

What version of Windows are you running? I’ve had very few issues with the PC app for the past year or so and I’ve got like 16 installed games on there right now, no problems.
 

Astray

Member
Seems like Microsoft indeed managed to find more growth on Steam than they did on Xboxes and thru PC Gamepass. Another W for S SneakersSO who was talking about this back during the ActiBlizz drama. No wonder they're looking into porting stuff to Playstation and Switch, it's because they got a taste of what real sales look like.

Forza Horizon and Sea of Thieves are the new big MVPs for Microsoft and it behooves them well to focus on those before anything else.

Also look at how close Pentiment came to matching Forza Motorsport despite costing less than half probably.

AAA development is a risky endeavor for sure.
 

pepodmc_

Member
Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.
You cant mod the game if you play it on gamepass. Modding its one of the biggest benefits of playing on pc.
In my case, i would play a game on gamepass only if i dont plant to mod it.

Any mod or mod manager that requires access to a games.exe will not work with PC Game Pass as this is a protected file. While mods will work with some game pass games, you are usually limited to mods that can just be dragged and dropped in the games install folder and don't modify protected files
 
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RespawnX

Member
Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.

Well, that's the problem on GAF. Most people here rely on their believings. It's like a crazy church with nerds and odd people.

Xbox printing around the same amount of money as Sony with around 1/3 of console install base. Guess why. Mostly solid GaaS at their studos, attractive sub model, good PC support.
 

Banjo64

cumsessed
Forza Horizon and Sea of Thieves are the new big MVPs for Microsoft and it behooves them well to focus on those before anything else.
Yeah. All this ‘SoT would be testing the water for Halo on PS’ is bullshit. No one gives a flying fuck about Halo anymore. If they port their biggest game, SoT, to PS and Switch that’s them basically saying any game is on the table.

Also look at how close Pentiment came to matching Forza Motorsport despite costing less than half probably.
Probably 1/10th the budget or even less.
 
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Astray

Member
There is really no reason those markets shouldn’t be exploited.
The opportunity cost of releasing FH and SoT late to the stronger markets shouldn't be underestimated tbh.

Starfield could have done 2 mil easily on PS5 on launch week alone, now? I don't think it will do as well. Same goes for SoT and maybe FH (latter one has basically no strong competition from what I've seen).
 

Valedix

Member
Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.
Starfield was a No.1 topseller on Steam during its pre order stage so I believe it.
 

Astray

Member
Yeah. All this ‘SoT would be testing the water for Halo on PS’ is bullshit. No one gives a flying fuck about Halo anymore. If they port their biggest game, SoT, to PS and Switch that’s them basically saying any game is on the table.
A lot of Xbox peeps are failing to see that the good steam figures have opened MS's eyes to where the true money lies.. 1P can be great if you are doing it right, but if you aren't, then you are fucked because all those stragglers on your platform are bringing in more costs than revenue, in that case, 3P is clearly far superior, and MS leadership clearly chose that now.

The only question is how their 1P/3P mix is going to devolve into a full 3P imo.
 

StueyDuck

Member
Sea of Thieves is a BEAST!
People can say what they want about the game overall but kudos to MS/rare on making it stick.

Putting it on steam and making it a steal of a price did that game wonders. Especially during its stint as a streaming zeitgeist
 
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Thread title is all that is needed. Ain't no way in hell Insomniac has this information to begin with.

Second, trying to extrapolate information this way from a potentially unreliable source is not worth the time taken to do it.
 

ChoosableOne

ChoosableAll
It's a coop zombie survival/base budling game that's rated very positively with 40k+ reviews on Steam. Yes, way. PC players love these kind of games.

State of Decay 2 is good (now) though?

Like after the Juggernaut patch (2020)/ Plague Territory patch (2021), and the various other patches beyond that, it became very good, just aside from the fact it's limited by its AA budget and it still has the odd bad/cringe characters every now and then. So yeah, they did mostly fix it after 3 years hahah.
steam charts-- 2000 daily players since 2020, probably the same people from the beginning lol.
If it's true, it's very interesting that they can reach this number on Steam despite Game Pass. Especially when interest in Sony games is so low.
 

Holammer

Member
Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.
Starfield got 139k user reviews on Steam. 1M copies usually results in an average 20-30k user reviews. So Steamspy's 5.48M estimate is close enough.
You might be in a Game Pass echo chamber if this is a surprise.
 
Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.

You're underestimating Steams dominance on PC.
 

ChoosableOne

ChoosableAll
Sony games are not a great match for the PC crowd. I don't think there's a single sandbox game in their catalogue, but I might be wrong.
I don't agree with the statement that PC gamers only play certain genres. On PC, you can play a much wider variety of games, but PC gamers also enjoy games that appeal to all gamers. I find it hard to believe that a game like Sackboy has only sold 60,000 copies, while State of Decay has sold 1.5 million copies.
 

Banjo64

cumsessed
Sony games are not a great match for the PC crowd. I don't think there's a single sandbox game in their catalogue, but I might be wrong.
True but then you see that something like Ori is selling 3.6m a game. Ori has a focus on tight gameplay though, which is the difference IMO.
 

diffusionx

Gold Member
Something has to be wrong here... I find it hard to believe that 4M+ people bought Starfield on PC outright. Being that it's on gamepass.

Unless I am missing something. And if it sold that much on PC alone... There is no way MS keeps that quiet and says nothing about it.
I don't think 4M is a lot for a game in development for 8 years and is the next from the studio that is still selling Skyrim over and over. Even if you account for the fact that people will be playing it on GamePass.
 
As Dusk Falls is an indie title probably cost less than 10 million to make. Ms gamepass paycheck and that 70 k steam sales with also the upcoming playstation release should be good enough. Redfall is a lesson here, wonder if ms are willing to learn from it.
 

MidGenRefresh

*Refreshes biennially
True but then you see that something like Ori is selling 3.6m a game. Ori has a focus on tight gameplay though, which is the difference IMO.

True. Tight gameplay also sells well on PC. The only Sony game that fits this description is Returnal, shame it didn't do well.

I don't agree with the statement that PC gamers only play certain genres.

No, we don't. We just prefer certain games over others. Check top played Steam games and you'll see the pattern.


I find it hard to believe that a game like Sackboy has only sold 60,000 copies, while State of Decay has sold 1.5 million copies.

They released it late and at full price. No wonder nobody bought it. There are better plaformers on PC for way, way less.
 
Well before everyone ITT immediately refuted the validity of OP's method (and yeah, considering the method, the title might be misleading), I was going to say...Forza Horizon 5 did pretty damn well in sales (at least in terms of units).

Even without the sales data, I can 100% see a future where MS just kills off the Forza Motorsport series and goes all-in on Forza Horizon instead.

FWIW, OP I admire your attempt to try extrapolating the data. It's always something worth respecting IMO. I don't think the methodology you used is THAT off, and for people doubting possible Starfield sales on PC...just remember that game had A LOT of refunds. So the sales you could extrapolate with OP's method could just be with only some or even none of the refunds accounted for.

Otherwise I'm looking at the numbers again and...they aren't too unrealistic to believe?
 
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StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
Well before everyone ITT immediately refuted the validity of OP's method (and yeah, considering the method, the title might be misleading), I was going to say...Forza Horizon 5 did pretty damn well in sales (at least in terms of units).

Even without the sales data, I can 100% see a future where MS just kills off the Forza Motorsport series and goes all-in on Forza Horizon instead.
A shame since I prefer FM. I'm not a racing fan either way, but picking one I'd pick circuit racers. I played FH2 or 3 and dont enjoy plowing through open world fields, smashing through fences, and drifting dirt fields in a sport car. You also get that lame narrator crap like it's a big party with fireworks. But I guess I'm in the minority. FH games seem to sell way better.
 
A shame since I prefer FM. I'm not a racing fan either way, but picking one I'd pick circuit racers. I played FH2 or 3 and dont enjoy plowing through open world fields, smashing through fences, and drifting dirt fields in a sport car. You also get that lame narrator crap like it's a big party with fireworks. But I guess I'm in the minority. FH games seem to sell way better.

Yeah, clearly so these days. I knew FH leapfrogged Motorsport a while ago but the gap's just seemingly massive today.

Again, the methodology in OP isn't 100%, and it's open to questioning, but I don't see the numbers being that unrealistic. Which, well, I don't know if these sales estimates would factor in refunds or not, but I guess that doesn't really matter.

Like is it that unrealistic to think Sea of Thieves has sold 9 million copies after 6-7 years? And we know the vast majority of its base is on PC, not Xbox. Ultimately these numbers would just be speaking to unit sales, not necessarily revenue. After all, I've seen Sea of Thieves on some deep sales multiple times on Steam over the years.

Sea of Thieves is a BEAST!

It's done well on PC, but let's not go too far here. That's a little over 9 million after 6, going on 7 years, and with multiple rounds at notable sales discounts to boot. I'd say its sales numbers should be expected on the average end given the amount of time it's been out.

Given the game's not a major seller on Xbox consoles, total sales are probably a bit over 10 million with that platform included.
 
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deriks

4-Time GIF/Meme God
Forza Motorsport is like crazy bad, man... Meanwhile Horizon did way better than I hoped to do (on the Steam base). Well deserved
 

Certinty

Member
“As Dusk Falls - 70k (fucking lol)“

The saddest part here is that this is genuinely one of the best games on that list.
 
It's done well on PC, but let's not go too far here. That's a little over 9 million after 6, going on 7 years, and with multiple rounds at notable sales discounts to boot. I'd say its sales numbers should be expected on the average end given the amount of time it's been out.

It's Silver or Gold in the year end charts on Steam most years (revenue based), which is quite good for the age of the game. https://store.steampowered.com/sale/BestOf2023?tab=1

I love the fact that AoE 4 is hanging in there at bronze for another year. RTS games need some love.
 
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johnny depp love GIF


Funny how everyone downplays its success at every turn.

Best game Rare's ever made and they keep making it better.

Most people aren't downplaying it's success. It's just that there are others trying to make it out like another Minecraft and that is absolutely not nor has ever been the case. The game had a rough start, and got better around the time it landed on Steam.

I mean 9.32 million is respectable but I'd also say that's a typical result for a game of SoT's caliber and history. It's a moderate success, but it's clearly not some GaaS heavyweight like certain fans have tried pushing over the years.

It's Silver or Gold in the year end charts on Steam most years (revenue based), which is quite good for the age of the game.

That's probably also including MTX & DLC content add-on sales tho; when I mentioned the sales discounts, I was just referring to the base game.
 
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K2D

Banned
This thread is a reach.

The reasoning in the slide is a reach as well. Comparing Spiderman IP by a known studio with a new IP by a lesser known studio.
 
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