Game News Divinity: Original Sin has sold 160,000 copies, already approaching profitability

[mindx2]

You don't buy new RPG to play it for 3 hours and never play it again. Especially fun RPG. Hell you can't even tell if game is shit or not for few hours. Also reviews aren't out yet so that means soon there will be major impact of sales and numbers.

This is why I haven't played an RPG for a long while. Seriously, lost my save games for Witcher 2 and only just re-downloaded that a month ago but haven't had the time to start again. Now it's on a computer I won't have access to for a few months while I work off my laptop, where I'm still playing the original Divine Divinity (after also losing my save game for that in the HDD crash).

Man, you get old and suddenly RPGs have this time commitment that's harder and harder to meet. But I'll get to D:OS eventually. Honest.

This is one of the perks of being a teacher, I get 2 months off during the summer and binge on my (very) large back catalog of games... . Original Sin came out at just the right time!! :D

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

I have a question for you guys. Given the wide-spread acclaim for D:OS, and considering your own personal enjoyment of the game, do you see yourself contributing even more to their next kickstarter, or about the same as you did last time?

I know I only contributed the bare minimum to get a copy of the game, but next time I think I will pledge $60 or more. I'm still a student so I really can't afford to go higher than that, but I'd like to throw every penny I can at Larian, they rock!

I actually missed this KS, was graciously given the game from a member who donated in my name, and now that I've seen the light will certainly, certainly give at least a $50-100 pledge if they do another KS. This really is a fantastic game.

 

[jdinatale]

Does Steam statistics compiler show an all-time peak for a game? (As in not just a daily peak). Because it would be interesting to see where Divinity: Original Sin's current all time peak compares to the last big main stream RPG to come out, which would be Dark Souls II.

 

[Zeriel]

Dark Souls 2 isn't an RPG, it's a console action game with RPG elements.

edit: plz don't take this as an opportunity to turn this into a WHAT'S AN RPG EH? thread.

 

[Mortmal]

Its back to top 1 today, could it be this game will end up selling like a blizzard game do ?
I could see that happen , user scores at metacritic is at 9.2 something rarely seen too. No doubt they will be able to afford any ip they want after that .

Yeah, no - I can see it selling well, but let's not get our hopes up too much. It isn't Diablo, and I doubt many companies, even fairly successful ones, could "afford any IP they want". It's just unrealistic.

If this game is successful, though, I don't see why they'd actually need to buy any existing IP at all. Like, what's the point? Unless it's something like Swen's childhood dream to make a game in the X franchise (in which case that's gotta be Ultima).

They dont need any existing IP but maybe they are big fan of one , maybe they are larping in secret with dragonlance costumes...As for the game not being diablo, well i think it captures a lot of what made blizzard games popular.If it reach the million sales, i will proudly quote myself with a big i told you so !

 

[Eddas]

There's a DOS thread on /v/ every day now, and it's usually positive. Unlike the dragon age threads.

I've been following some threads over there and the majority of them are surprisingly good. There is, as aways, people trying ot ruin the thread, but there are many people discussing the game in a healthy way too. It's a little odd for /v/ to have a healthy discussion.

Dark Souls 2 isn't an RPG, it's a console action game with RPG elements.

edit: plz don't take this as an opportunity to turn this into a WHAT'S AN RPG EH? thread.

But what is- ok, ok... I agree, the last good RPG with a good cover from media released on steam was... I have no idea. It is not a good comparison, I know, but it's what I first thought would be cool to do: compare the EE of Baldur's Gate I and II with the sales of DOS.

Does Steam statistics compiler show an all-time peak for a game? (As in not just a daily peak). Because it would be interesting to see where Divinity: Original Sin's current all time peak compares to the last big main stream RPG to come out, which would be Dark Souls II.

You could aways use this: http://steamcharts.com/app/230230

But you would have to consider games released after that tool came to life. The site was registered on April 12, 2012, so it's not a good source for old games.

BUT

Baldur's Gate I EE all time peak: 2.236.
Baldur's Gate II EE all time peak: 2.644.

Those two on steam. And I know that is not a good idea, since those are old games and most of the original players did not bought this version. This is just some fun with the numbers.

After 6 months on the market, The Witcher 2 sold, on GOG and Steam, respectively: 35.000 and 200.000 copies. But they had physical copies too, the amount of sale comes to past 1 million if we combine the medias (for the same period of time). It's another topic worth of exploration: the people who bought physical copies would buy the steam version, in the absence of the physical ones? Comparing just steam sales, DOS is pretty close to Witcher 2.

Now, sad news: http://www.gaugepowered.com/game/5673/

If this tool can be used with precison, the sample of players (roughly 1400) have 2,5 hours logged in the game. Let's see how this changes this weekend, but the majority of players did not go past 2.5 hours until now (if the sample truly represents the population). This means the sales are going pretty good for the 10.000-15.000 peak of players every day.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Eddas, the Witcher 2 comparison can be deceptive. That game was released in May 2011, and at that point Steam had about half the active users it has right now. Also, as far as I'm aware, physical copies of D:OS (not the kickstarter backer ones, backers get a choice) all activate on Steam as well, so they'd be accounted for in the player numbers.

 

[Eddas]

Eddas, the Witcher 2 comparison can be deceptive. That game was released in May 2011, and at that point Steam had about half the active users it has right now. Also, as far as I'm aware, physical copies of D:OS (not the kickstarter backer ones, backers get a choice) all activate on Steam as well, so they'd be accounted for in the player numbers.

No, retail version of The Witcher 2 did not register with steam. Today you can use your steam key to activate an "extra" copy at GOG, including the extra goodies. But the hard copies of the game did not required Steam to play (at the time of release at least).

 

[Eddas]

I just read what you really wrote back there... Forget the last post. Regarding the physical copies of D:OS, yes, they require Steam activation.

About the userbase you are right, I forgot that part. Just last year, the Winter Sale raised Steam userbase from 6 to 7 million.

Larian did a good job delivering a good atmosphere, to attract new players to the genre. Even the trailer has this appeal, brings out curiosity about the game. They did not had a good advertisement campaing, but at least they did good with what they had. I mean, with this little space at steam main page they must have grabbed a lot of newcomers, and this numbers definitely are higher than they were at 2011. The comparison is not good indeed.

 

[mbpopolano24]

Does Steam statistics compiler show an all-time peak for a game? (As in not just a daily peak). Because it would be interesting to see where Divinity: Original Sin's current all time peak compares to the last big main stream RPG to come out, which would be Dark Souls II.

Dark Souls 2 all-time peak: 79,528

http://steamcharts.com/app/236430

 

[Crooked Bee]

Yeah, but it's, like, Dark Souls -- an already well-established franchise, and one of the best in today's industry to boot.

They dont need any existing IP but maybe they are big fan of one , maybe they are larping in secret with dragonlance costumes...As for the game not being diablo, well i think it captures a lot of what made blizzard games popular.If it reach the million sales, i will proudly quote myself with a big i told you so !

I certainly wouldn't mind it selling 1 million, so feel free to quote yourself on that

 

[mbpopolano24]

Let me clarify. If there is a relationship between all-time peak players and number of copies sold, it is certainly non-linear. Skyrim sold a gazillion copies and the all-time peak is lower than Dark Souls at 78,420 (http://steamcharts.com/app/72850 ).

The number of players some significant time after release look to be a better index. After several years, today peak for Skyrim was still over 50,000. Dark Souls: 11,000.

 

[mbpopolano24]

18,131 players now, very encouraging. We can only hope....

 

[Renegen]

I'm not sure this is a fair comparison. Skyrim's early sales were probably on consoles and the lowest numbers Skyrim has ever gotten (from what I can see) is within a few months of the game coming out at 31,000. Following that there were several spikes in popularity, each likely coinciding with big sales, which only existed on PC. New players trickled in, possibly even players that would've preferred to buy it on consoles but they didn't have such sales. I know Skyrim's been discounted 75% this past week and the numbers shot up again. RPGs have always had long sale lives and with Steam this has been even more amplified. DS2 hasn't had the sale numbers yet to see how it reacts compared to Skyrim and whether it will stay at 11,000 forever, the only way we can truly compare both games is at the beginning of their lives, both have has falling peak players, although Skyrim was more much stable.

 

[Arkeus]

So, huh, the 160K copies sold was published early the 3rd of July, and from a secondary source (so it was probably late on the 2nd). Almost three days have passed since the 160K copies, and D:OS has been consistently on the top selling list of steam- anyone knows enough to make rough estimates as to what it could mean for the numbers of sales since then?

 

[Angthoron]

So, huh, the 160K copies sold was published early the 3rd of July, and from a secondary source (so it was probably late on the 2nd). Almost three days have passed since the 160K copies, and D:OS has been consistently on the top selling list of steam- anyone knows enough to make rough estimates as to what it could mean for the numbers of sales since then?

It's pretty hard to say, since we'd have to see what the rest of the sales numbers actually are. It's probably looking pretty good though, and considering MeatCritic user grade just grew another .1 over the last 24 hours, and the official reviews are piling in (and their user scores are in mid-to-high 9s, too) at last, I can only guess that the sales figures will end up pretty high.

Also, gotta say, the co-op hook is pretty good - you start out, you see a couple of character interactions, and then you'll be like "Oh, I'd like to do this, but with a real person". Then you go and talk to friends and tell them about this cool new game that also lets players interact in dialogues, and a bunch more copies is sold. Is a good idea.

 

[tuluse]

So, huh, the 160K copies sold was published early the 3rd of July, and from a secondary source (so it was probably late on the 2nd). Almost three days have passed since the 160K copies, and D:OS has been consistently on the top selling list of steam- anyone knows enough to make rough estimates as to what it could mean for the numbers of sales since then?

The top seller numbers vary widely depending on when it's happening. Right after a sale like right now is a lower time.

 

[mindx2]

Nice to see it's still the #1 seller on Steam even after all these days. Any mind-numbing AAA titles being released soon for the unwashed masses on Steam? If not Larian were geniuses to release it when they did.

Edit: just glancing through the Steam forums is encouraging as it appears most seem to really like the game. Positive word of mouth on Steam will certainly help their sales. Very pleased to see the positive reaction even in the bastion of AAA decadence.

 

[Eddas]

The peak for players is increasing at a rate of 3.000 players/day. Could be the weekend, I don't know.

 

[Crooked Bee]

to type a quick answer from my tablet (i'm so sorry), larian are actually much more business savyy than i gave them credit for

- co-op
i though it would suck and be a gimmick and also fail hard. oh how wrong i was

in fact i cant wait to play it in coop myself tomorrow, lol

- release day
the last day of steam sale, are they crazy? and yet here we are

- no reviews on day one because the game was only finished on release day basically
this also sounds insane compared to how you'd usually want your reviews yto come in on day one. but in this case, it's word of mouth which is carrying the game! and who knows if it's gonna get better or worse once the 'big' reviews start pouring in

all in all i gotta hand it to larian, they pretty much defied all my expectations (and not least w/r/t the game's quality)

 

[ZoddGuts]

Crazy how much depth the game has. Now I understand as to why they had to cut Day/Night cycle, it would have been too much for them to do on the budget they had. If they do another Kickstarter hopefully due to goodwill from people who enjoyed D:OS, they'll give enough money for Larian to put Day/Night cycles in their next game.

 

[Xenich]

Crazy how much depth the game has. Now I understand as to why they had to cut Day/Night cycle, it would have been too much for them to do on the budget they had. If they do another Kickstarter hopefully due to goodwill from people who enjoyed D:OS, they'll give enough money for Larian to put Day/Night cycles in their next game.

From what I understand, the problem wasn't that Day/Night cycles were too much to implement in general, rather they were too much to implement into a game that was already mostly finished. That is, they would have had to redesign a lot of the content in the game which would have been far more time consuming and difficult than if they were to design a game with day/night cycles in mind from the start. The current engine supports everything they intended to do with that stretch goal so any "new" games they make with the engine should be ready for that feature without too much difficulty.

 

[jdinatale]

Crazy how much depth the game has. Now I understand as to why they had to cut Day/Night cycle, it would have been too much for them to do on the budget they had. If they do another Kickstarter hopefully due to goodwill from people who enjoyed D:OS, they'll give enough money for Larian to put Day/Night cycles in their next game.

yeah then there could be night themed missions, like breaking into buildings and killing people, perhaps killing their dog, poisoning their groceries, maybe trap their house like Home Alone, etc.

 

[jdinatale]

So, huh, the 160K copies sold was published early the 3rd of July, and from a secondary source (so it was probably late on the 2nd). Almost three days have passed since the 160K copies, and D:OS has been consistently on the top selling list of steam- anyone knows enough to make rough estimates as to what it could mean for the numbers of sales since then?

about 350

 

[Zeriel]

Crazy how much depth the game has. Now I understand as to why they had to cut Day/Night cycle, it would have been too much for them to do on the budget they had. If they do another Kickstarter hopefully due to goodwill from people who enjoyed D:OS, they'll give enough money for Larian to put Day/Night cycles in their next game.

yeah then there could be night themed missions, like breaking into buildings and killing people, perhaps killing their dog, poisoning their groceries, maybe trap their house like Home Alone, etc.

Been thinking about this...

I think I prefer night missions/swappable day & night maps to implementing day/night cycles in standard maps. Day/Night cycle is best used as a theme for new content, not as a layer on old content, imo. One of the few interesting things Dragon Age 2 hinted at was day and night having separate maps for the city districts.