So, I geeked out and made the following estimates...
According to
Steam Charts, in the last 30 days DOS has been played about 5.3 million hours on steam.
Assuming the ratio of peak players and hours played is constant, I extrapolated this backwards:
1. The area under the 'peak players' graph was 340k players x days for the last 30 days.
2. Thus, the ratio of hours played over that area is 5.3 Mil hours / 340 players*days = 15.6 kHrs / player-days
3. Applying this backward to the previous 30 days, we have another 496k player-days, so if we take the above ratio, that's another 496*15.8kHrs or 7.7 Mil hours.
4. Total hours played then would then be about 13 Million hours so far. Let's say this is with ï½±15% error because (a) the above method is rather crude (b) Steam sometimes under-reports hours played.
Now, I've also estimated the average number played per player to be between 15-20 hours. The estimate is based on:
1. Ars Technica's Steam Gauge data (has a rough pie-chart breakdown of average playtime on Steam)
2. Steam achievement percentages coupled with my estimates on how long it takes to reach each one. In particular:
- 44.6% have not found the Pyramids teleporters - this usually occurs in the first few hours of play, so these players are probably disinterested. Assumed 1.5 hrs played on average in this bracket.
- 26.1% found the pyramids, but haven't killed Evelyn yet. That means they've at least played a few hours, but probably not over 25. I assumed an average of 10 hrs for this bracket.
- 15.6% killed Evelyn, but haven't met the conduit yet. Probably played more than 8 hours and no more than 60. I assumed an average of 30 hours on this bracket.
- 5.3% have met the conduit, but haven't reached hunter's edge yet. That's at least 20 hours in, but no more than 120. I assumed 45 hours on average.
- 3.9% have arrived at Hunter's edge, but not at the Source Temple. Yadda yadda assumed 60 hours.
- 1.1% have reached Source Temple, but haven't beat the game. Assumed 75 hours. This piece of data is also backed by Larian saying it's an 80 hour game and also
reports on this site.
- The rest (3.4%) have beat the game, at least once. Assumed 120 hours on average.
This adds up to 17.6 hours on average. I've thus used the range 15-20 hrs per player (i.e. about 17.5 ?ï½± 15%), which is roughly what you'd get if you slapped a 40% error margin on each individual bracket estimate and assumed they are independent error factors.
Assuming the two error factors are uncorrelated, all this roughly translates to about 750k ?ï½± 20%, or between 600-900k. Which is not far off from my previous post too, if you account for the month that has passed since
So, was I close Larian?
It's also a good time to announce since the sales rate must be dropping by now...
