The GameDiscoverCo e-newsletter is a daily biz-centric have a look at how folks uncover and purchase video video games within the 2020s, that includes ‘how they bought tens of millions’ posts, charts, and the most recent recreation discovery & platform information. It’s written by GDCo founder Simon Carless.
We’re right here: final cease for 2024, everyone off, the GDCo e-newsletter is heading to the depot. Earlier than we stop for the annum, huge like to our rising band of colleagues at GDCo: Alejandro, Avi, Matt, Tomek and Strale – constructing our recreation information and data platform proper, behind the scenes. (Some thrilling information about that in Jan!)
And the opposite set of individuals to thank? Why, it’s you! Now we have over 32,500 GDCo e-newsletter subscribers – up from 22k firstly of 2024 – and nearly 3,000 of you’ve entry to the Plus tier or increased, by way of particular person and firm subscription. Our boundless enthusiasm is fueled by yours, and we deeply respect the chance.
[FINAL BOSS: for EOY, please support GameDiscoverCo by subscribing to GDCo Plus right now. You get basic access to our ‘core’ Steam data back-end, full access to our second weekly newsletter, our lively – and entertaining – Discord, eight game discovery eBooks & lots more.]
Sport discovery information: Fortnite’s new mode developments!
Earlier than we get into all the opposite chart goodness, let’s take a look across the recreation platform and discovery information since late final week, huh? Right here we go go go:
- We’ve been maintaining a tally of the Fortnite real-time CCU charts since Epic rolled out its Ballistic first-person shooter mode, in addition to up to date Lego Fortnite ‘Odyssey’ and that new Lego Fortnite Brick Life recreation mode. Proper now (above!), each Ballistic and OG Lego Fortnite are ~100k CCU – we’ll see how they maintain!
- November 2024’s UK recreation charts had been down 33% YoY, however most of that dip was on account of transferring Name Of Responsibility to Oct. this 12 months, and Black Friday not being within the Nov. information set. Nonetheless: “1.53 million video games had been bought throughout Black Friday week, which is a fall of over 8% in contrast with Black Friday 2023.” So maybe not that stellar anyway.
- Right here’s a great piece on how Gorilla Tag on Quest scaled to $100m income: “predominantly performed by boys aged 10-18, [it] has turn out to be their third place. One-third of the sport’s month-to-month gamers log in day by day, with server exercise peaking after college hours. Youngsters are drawn… by the prospect to fulfill pals and play on a digital playground.”
- Some good stats and data on saying Duck Detective’s sequel for Steam: “We hit 11k wishlists inside the first 4 days… that is actually promising. To date it’s 95% extra wishlists than the first recreation in the identical time interval.” In-game promotion actually helps!
- Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella doubled down on the ‘we’re in all places’ chatter coming from Xbox lately, per Sport File ($): “It’s about having the ability to get pleasure from Xbox on all of your gadgets… in [the] long-term, as an organization, we will deliver the perfect of the AI innovation, cloud innovation, console innovation, PC innovation to construct the perfect video games, that may be loved by avid gamers in all places.”
- Twitch’s annual recap exhibits there have been 879 million hours streamed and 20.35 billion hours watched throughout the video platform (!) in 2024, with Grand Theft Auto V (1.46b hours watched) topping classes worldwide, ‘simulator’ video games having a 91% YoY viewing improve, and plenty extra.
- Roblox CEO David Baszucki is celebrating a few spectacular concurrent person milestones on the platform: “Costume to Impress went over 1.5M concurrent gamers this morning. And Blox Fruits simply went over 2.25M concurrent gamers.” These are each big numbers – increased than something on Steam besides possibly Counter-Strike 2.
- That brief, low cost ($3!) however very viral Steam horror recreation The Cabin Manufacturing facility which we profiled the opposite week is out already, and it bought 30k models within the first 3 days due to large streamers hopping on: “373,232 hours watched [on Twitch] in complete… caseoh_ was the highest stream with 53,206 viewers, then LIRIK with 19,560 peak viewers, and ironmouse with 9,257.”
- Apple shared the most-downloaded free and paid iPhone video games of 2024. And within the U.S., stalwarts Minecraft, Heads Up! and Geometry Sprint headlined paid iPhone video games. As for F2P, seems to be like Block Blast!, Monopoly Go!, Roblox, Name Of Responsibility Warzone Cell, Township, and Final Warfare: Survival topped U.S. charts.
- Microlinks: Nintendo nonetheless hadn’t taken motion on the Unpacking ‘clones’ on the Change eShop, however possibly simply lastly did;; Steam had a brand new ‘shopping retailer/taking part in’ CCU peak of 39.3 million final weekend; gamers can now select to cease their Steam video games autopatching, if they’re too large – or they don’t play them.
Revealed: prime new PC and console video games of 2024
A few of it’s possible you’ll recall that on the finish of 2023, GameDiscoverCo ran down the highest new video games of the 12 months throughout PC and console platforms, in accordance with our giant and complicated (and enjoyable!) estimation algorithms. Properly, we’re again for extra in 2024.
Let’s begin out with what’s doubtless a very powerful platform for the overwhelming majority of recreation builders in 2024 – Valve’s Steam PC recreation launcher and retailer. We’ll have two views for this chart – copies bought and income. And right here’s ‘copies bought’ for paid video games:
Picture: GameDiscoverCo
Some notes on this intriguing view? There are just a few extra surprises right here than within the upcoming console charts, however:
- The highest three video games are those you’d count on, within the order you’d count on: that’s Chinese language motion RPG sensation Black Delusion: Wukong, sizzling in all places ‘Pokemon recruitment meets survival crafter’ Palworld, and co-op bug blaster Helldivers 2.
- Loads of cheaper, cleverer viral sensations crowd the chart: that’d embrace the masocore multiplayer ‘Solely Up!’-inspired Chained Collectively (#4), ‘cheat to victory’ card recreation Liar’s Bar (#6), and the newly multiplayer twisted cube recreation Buckshot Roulette (#10).
- Path Of Exile 2 is the late-breaking shock chart entrant: We’re very impressed with ‘paid now, F2P later’ Souls-Diablo-like PoE 2, which already made it to #5, regardless of solely being out there for 11 days. (At this time’s peak of 437k CCU on Steam is critically good.)
Additionally notable in right here – the ‘intricate first-person retailer administration sim’ microgenre perfected by Grocery store Simulator (#7) spawned a second related recreation within the Prime 20, TCG Card Store Simulator (#16) And there are different, smaller hits like Quick Meals Simulator on the best way. (This style is catnip to streamers, specifically.)
Lastly, to present you an thought of scale – all the video games within the above chart bought >1 million models on Steam, and additional up, 4 of them bought >5 million, and 14 of them >2 million copies. (Over time, they’ll most likely promote much more than that, after all.)
Picture: GameDiscoverCo
We additionally thought we’d briefly characteristic the highest paid video games by gross income – which incorporates IAP/DLC estimates. That’s partly why titles like soccer sim EA Sports activities FC 25 – a uncommon ‘larger on console than PC’ title anyhow – shoot up from #14 to #7.
This view additionally pulls all the cheap titles off the charts, and grabs some premium priced, beforehand ‘simply outdoors the Prime 20’ video games like Dragon Age: The Veilguard, Grey Zone Warfare and Farming Simulator 25 into the highest listing. Is sensible, huh?
Subsequent up, let’s check out prime new PlayStation paid video games of 2024. BTW, we’ve determined to solely present ‘# of gamers’ view right here, as a result of the income chart doesn’t differ a lot in any respect. (Most prime PlayStation video games are additionally premium priced.)
Picture: GameDiscoverCo
Some notes on this chart, which we don’t assume is sudden – duh, EA Sports activities FC & Name Of Responsibility – however has a few small surprises, just like the overperformance of Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero (#7):
- Sports activities video games are half of the Prime 10 on PlayStation: there’s loads of different titles within the combine. However between perennial soccer, basketball, American soccer, and wrestling video games, that’s 5 of the highest worldwide slots used up. (It’s a sports activities console – no less than for brand spanking new, paid video games!)
- Black Delusion: Wukong confirmed PS5’s ‘hidden’ energy in China: we’re estimating >3.5 million Chinese language PlayStation gamers of the cultural sensation, greater than 50% of its PlayStation gross sales. (They usually’re all ‘grey market’, by the best way.)
- PlayStation acquired 4 of its personal titles within the Prime 20: these can be Helldivers 2 (#6), The Final Of Us Half II Remastered (#10, with the caveat that there was a $10 improve for homeowners of the unique), Astro Bot (#15), and MLB The Present 24 (#17).
Models-wise, we’re estimating all the above video games to have bought >1 million models, with about 11 of them cresting 2 million LTD, and 5 promoting >5 million models. That’s some helpful context on the final dimension of the marketplace for the tiptop new titles.
For extra platform context: we didn’t do an general Prime 20 by DAU/MAU throughout all PlayStation video games, no matter age, in 2024. However you’ll have seen Fortnite, Name Of Responsibility, Grand Theft Auto V, Roblox and Minecraft as a few of the key perennials.
Picture: GameDiscoverCo
Let’s check out Xbox! And we’re ignoring Sport Move this 12 months – for which the prime 5 new GP video games by obtain # had been Palworld, MLB The Present 24, Little Kitty, Massive Metropolis, Hellblade II and Indiana Jones, btw – and concentrating on paid video games. Notes:
- Xbox consoles are robust within the U.S. – so (American) soccer wins: who would have guess the highest new paid online game of the 12 months on Xbox can be a university soccer title? (Anyone who is aware of how fanatical school soccer followers are!)
- Warhammer 40k: Area Marine 2 and Star Wars Outlaws did ‘effectively’ on Xbox: once more, we predict it’s all the way down to the US and UK-centric nature of the licenses. However each Area Marine 2 (#5) and Outlaws (#7) – had approach nearer to a 1:1 ratio between Xbox and PlayStation than different main titles. Each simply missed the Prime 20 on PS.
- Sport Move & Xbox console slowdown has made paid video games approach slower: that’s why you see Suicide Squad (#13) on the listing – tho it’s had a 95% off sale. However typically, Xbox’s gross sales numbers don’t compete with PS/Steam. We see 4 new video games at >1 million models, and 11 at >500k, however #20 is lower than 200k models.
Lastly, we already printed a bunch of Nintendo Change charts final month. We didn’t have an opportunity to replace them – most likely MySims Cozy Bundle can be the one main new entry, if we did. However right here’s the eShop new video games chart we had:
Picture: GameDiscoverCo
And that’s all of our gloriously calculated information. Little question there’s a glitch or two in right here. For instance, Name Of Responsibility may be very troublesome to estimate on account of its uber ‘CoD HQ’ app strategy, and there’s gotchas with demo/trial variations of video games (Cranium & Bones?)
However we’ve executed our greatest. Solutions on a postcard in the event you can see something we clearly missed or over-rated, and we’ll right it within the New Yr. And thanks for studying the 2024 chart jamboree!
The Sport Awards : which video games got here out on prime?
Lastly – GDCO’s lovely information packrat* (*we’ve a number of!) Alejandro determined to start out engaged on a large doc buzz from The Sport Awards 2024 bulletins (Google Drive doc). So we crunched information & teamed up with ICO’s nice Footprints.gg ‘conventional media’ article monitoring service for a second viewpoint.
Earlier than we begin – in the event you’re nonetheless attempting to choose a few of the TGA bulletins out of your tooth, so many and complicated had been they, we appreciated Talent Up’s 30 minute abstract of the entire ceremony (above). (Or in the event you simply want Statler and Waldorf from The Muppets clowning on Geoff Keighley, we’ve acquired a highlights vid for you too!)
Picture: GameDiscoverCo
So, our first view (above) of post-awards buzz is solely, in accordance with Footprints.gg, which of TGA’s bulletins – even these with none digital retailer web page but – acquired essentially the most trad media curiosity. (It’s tab #3 within the doc.) Brief notes:
- The Witcher 4 ‘gained’, as a result of duh: nearly all of CD Projekt has been engaged on this motion RPG sequel for a while, however good to see it confirmed.
- Current IP made up eight of the highest ten most-discussed video games: that features the brand new Elden Ring spinoff, an early in dev Okami sequel, the following Mafia recreation, the brand new Onimusha, and Borderlands 4. Phew, sequels!
- Unique IP curiosity was led by Intergalactic: the following Naughty Canine recreation – which some wags are joking is its solely new IP for the last decade – was #3. The opposite new IP video games within the Prime 10 – sorta a religious sequel – is Cut up Fiction, from It Take Two’s sweary Josef Fares.
Picture: GameDiscoverCo
The opposite views we’re championing utilizing GameDiscoverCo information are TGA-related video games with Steam pages, calculating charts by follower and wishlist improve. (For current video games with DLC, we’re simply monitoring the primary recreation web page.)
That’s in tab #1 and tab #2 within the doc, and we’re simply doing the ‘Steam follower improve’ chart above. Temporary data on it:
- Elden Ring Nightreign finally ends up reigning supreme: the sudden standalone co-op journey added >40,000 followers and 800,000 Steam wishlists very quickly.
- PC variations of current PlayStation video games maintain getting hype: many are excited that Closing Fantasy VII Rebirth (#2) is lastly coming to PC, and related for The Final Of Us: Half 2 Remastered (#7).
- Unique IP declares are led by Kyora: surprisingly, the multiplayer 2D sandbox from the Core Keeper devs was the 100% authentic IP title with essentially the most further followers, post-announce.
There’s additionally loads of different notable titles choosing up curiosity right here – from survival ‘religious successor’ Blackfrost: The Lengthy Darkish 2 to superhero office comedy (!) Dispatch. Fascinating to see what pops out, huh?
And that’s actually all we’ve for the 12 months from GameDiscoverCo! We’ll be again within the first full week of January, and have a beautiful – and quiet – vacation. Toodles…
