Eternity PoE II: Deadfire Sales Analysis Thread

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

And even the eventual success of Baldur's Gate surprised most involved. Most modern games seem to roughly follow that pattern, despite there being a lot more games and competition around.

There is a lot of herd mentality involved. People buy or play games they don't like because they want to be on the loop of what everyone else is doing, or at least what they assume everyone else is doing. That explains why players willfully ignore a huge backlog of classics to play the next shit, even when it is obviously trash. It is naive to think that the content of the game is taken in consideration, because what matters to these players is the social aspect involved, not the game or gaming themselves.

 

[Fairfax]

Games on steam in general have low % achievement / completion. Someone's examples with Skyrim and Fallout 4 being high % are probably as high as games go on steam.

Quite a lot of people buy games and only test them for a few minutes. FNV is a good example with data: 11.5% of players never got past Doc Mitchell. These people didn't really play the game, so the fact they abandoned it doesn't say anything about it. Skyrim probably had a decent % of people doing the same, so although its completion rate is not among the highest, it's still impressive.

Completion rates I posted in another thread, with D:OS2 up to date (8.5%->9.8% since January):

• Mass Effect 2: 56%
• South Park: Stick of Truth: 47%
• Mass Effect 3: 42%
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution: 37.2%
• Dragon Age: Origins: 36%
• Dark Souls 2: 33%
• Deus Ex: Mankind Divided: 32.4%
• Skyrim: 32%
• The Witcher 3: 26.5%
• Fallout 4: 25.2%
• The Witcher 2: 18.9%
• Invisible, Inc: 18.9%
• The Banner Saga: 16.4%
• Tides of Numenera: 14.4%
• Dragon’s Dogma: 12.1% (2.8% twice)
• Legend of Grimrock: 10.3%
• Pillars of Eternity: 10.2%
• Divinity: Original Sin 2: 9.8%
• Legend of Grimrock 2: 8.3%
• Blackguards: 7.6%
• Divinity: Original Sin: 6.6%
• Expeditions: Conquistador: 5.1%
• Darkest Dungeon: 2.1%

Some games have an achievement for each different ending, so I did some estimates ranging from 1-30% of players doing more than one ending, capped at pre-ending achievements if available:

FNV: 17-24% (19-27% if you only include players who got past Doc Mitchell)
Dark Souls 3: 30-37%
Tyranny: 20-27%
Wasteland 2: 5-6%
Shadowrun Dragonfall: 11-15%
Shadowrun Hong Kong: 25-33%

[Note: BioWare released their own numbers and included consoles]

 

[Infinitron]

Fairfax I played Hotline Miami 2 a few years ago, and was shocked by how high its achievement/completion rates were. A genuinely difficult game that the masses of people enjoy spending the time to beat. You look at YouTube comments and all the normies are familiar with the details of the story and everything. Very interesting.

 

[Molina]

Games on steam in general have low % achievement / completion. Someone's examples with Skyrim and Fallout 4 being high % are probably as high as games go on steam.

Quite a lot of people buy games and only test them for a few minutes. FNV is a good example with data: 11.5% of players never got past Doc Mitchell. These people didn't really play the game, so the fact they abandoned it doesn't say anything about it. Skyrim probably had a decent % of people doing the same, so although its completion rate is not among the highest, it's still impressive.

Completion rates I posted in another thread, with D:OS2 up to date (8.5%->9.8% since January):

• Mass Effect 2: 56%
• South Park: Stick of Truth: 47%
• Mass Effect 3: 42%
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution: 37.2%
• Dragon Age: Origins: 36%
• Dark Souls 2: 33%
• Deus Ex: Mankind Divided: 32.4%
• Skyrim: 32%
• The Witcher 3: 26.5%
• Fallout 4: 25.2%
• The Witcher 2: 18.9%
• Invisible, Inc: 18.9%
• The Banner Saga: 16.4%
• Tides of Numenera: 14.4%
• Dragon’s Dogma: 12.1% (2.8% twice)
• Legend of Grimrock: 10.3%
• Pillars of Eternity: 10.2%
• Divinity: Original Sin 2: 9.8%
• Legend of Grimrock 2: 8.3%
• Blackguards: 7.6%
• Divinity: Original Sin: 6.6%
• Expeditions: Conquistador: 5.1%
• Darkest Dungeon: 2.1%

Some games have an achievement for each different ending, so I did some estimates ranging from 1-30% of players doing more than one ending, capped at pre-ending achievements if available:

FNV: 17-24% (19-27% if you only include players who got past Doc Mitchell)
Dark Souls 3: 30-37%
Tyranny: 20-27%
Wasteland 2: 5-6%
Shadowrun Dragonfall: 11-15%
Shadowrun Hong Kong: 25-33%

[Note: BioWare released their own numbers and included consoles]

Finishing a game and playing a game it's quite different IMHO. For Poe, I think we can go around the game in 15-20 hours, and then it's gonna be more of the same.

(PS : Thank you for the stat !)

 

[frajaq]

Fairfax I played Hotline Miami 2 a few years ago, and was shocked by how high its achievement/completion rates were. A genuinely difficult game that the masses of people enjoy spending the time to beat. You look at YouTube comments and all the normies are familiar with the details of the story and everything. Very interesting.

Well that game had style, cool gameplay and a genuinely engaging story

As much as I'm enjoying PoE 2 I feel like the game is lackluster in some regards to those

 

[fantadomat]

Games on steam in general have low % achievement / completion. Someone's examples with Skyrim and Fallout 4 being high % are probably as high as games go on steam.

Yeah.

I checked the global achievements for Battle Brothers recently and only 77% even finished the first contract (killing Hogart) wich should take under 15 minutes, less than 10% beat an endgame crisis.

It's madness.

BB gets very repetitive after a few battles. It is a good game but not one where you pump yourself to finish it. I played a few hours and got bored,the game have huge potential but it is very repetitive.

It's certainly a game that divides minds and the lost potential is tragic - but almost a quarter of players couldn't or wouldn't stick with it for 15 minutes.

You should at least give it a try, no? Not only BB but every game you were interested in enough to buy it.

Sadly that is a part of steam culture and the nu gamers. Part of the modern consumerism religion that is in the west.

Lol Fairfax,didn't know that wasteland 2 have such low finish percent. Yet it is not a surprise,even i didn't have the guts to finish it.

 

[Azarkon]

Divine Divinity: Original Sin 2 sold as well or better than Divine Divinity: Original Sin; so there are certainly cases, even today, where sequels out sell. I have a feeling marketing has a lot to do with it, as well as the reception of the first game, but since I didn't follow the marketing campaigns of most of these games, I'm not going to speak about them.

 

[Nightfall]

Completion rates I posted in another thread, with D:OS2 up to date (8.5%->9.8% since January):

• Mass Effect 2: 56%
• South Park: Stick of Truth: 47%
• Mass Effect 3: 42%
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution: 37.2%
• Dragon Age: Origins: 36%
• Dark Souls 2: 33%
• Deus Ex: Mankind Divided: 32.4%
• Skyrim: 32%
• The Witcher 3: 26.5%
• Fallout 4: 25.2%
• The Witcher 2: 18.9%
• Invisible, Inc: 18.9%
• The Banner Saga: 16.4%
• Tides of Numenera: 14.4%
• Dragon’s Dogma: 12.1% (2.8% twice)
• Legend of Grimrock: 10.3%
• Pillars of Eternity: 10.2%
• Divinity: Original Sin 2: 9.8%
• Legend of Grimrock 2: 8.3%
• Blackguards: 7.6%
• Divinity: Original Sin: 6.6%
• Expeditions: Conquistador: 5.1%
• Darkest Dungeon: 2.1%

Some games have an achievement for each different ending, so I did some estimates ranging from 1-30% of players doing more than one ending, capped at pre-ending achievements if available:

FNV: 17-24% (19-27% if you only include players who got past Doc Mitchell)
Dark Souls 3: 30-37%
Tyranny: 20-27%
Wasteland 2: 5-6%
Shadowrun Dragonfall: 11-15%
Shadowrun Hong Kong: 25-33%
[Note: BioWare released their own numbers and included consoles]

There are 2 editions of Divinity: Original Sin(Classic and Enhanced), and the achievements do not carry over. Summing both up(6.4%+7.1%=13.5%) is probably a more accurate estimation of it's completion rate.

 

[Micormic]

Meh, got burned by Obsidian too many times, only way I play this is if I manage to pick it up in a humble bundle or something.



Curious to anyone who's played it, is it better then the first one?

 

[aweigh]

Completion rates mean shit. I sunk around 600 hours into FNV before deciding to do the Hoover Dam battle, and it was only because someone asked me to do it.

I probably played PoE 1 3/4's of the way through, basically up until ending segment, around 3 times, and to this day I have never bothered doing Thaos fight (I just saw ending on youtube).

It goes on like that for most RPGs/games I play: I usually stop right before the ending segment and either drop it, or restart it and play again up to that point. Point is I know for a fact a lot of people are similar in the way they play games.

To me the sign of enjoyment of a game is how many times I restarted it, not whether I finished it.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

Did that really change hugely much, by the way? That core market back then probably wasn't any hugely bigger if you consider that for every Baldur's Gate surpassing the 1 million after like a year on the shelves, there was an Icewind Dale (and much smaller scale products by lesser known developers than the guys who OMG did Fallout!). That market is still there.

No, it is not. The people who bought BG grew up and now most of them don't have the time or interest in cRPGs. The new generation was hijacked by other (more popular) genres. So yeah, selling a million units with PoE is a sort of miracle that is not representative of the actual cRPG players out there.

I'm not sure that market ever really existed. It was a miracle that the Baldur's Gate games sold so well, but even then the first Baldur's Gate only moved about half a million units in its first two years (yeah, PoE has sold better than BG over the first few years after release). Fallout 2 didn't even crack 150,000 over the same period; nor did Fallout 1 despite having an extra year of sales.

Icewind Dale sold 270,000 copies in the United States during its first five years; I can't find the international figures, but I doubt it broke 500,000 globally. Icewind Dale 2 sold 100,000 copies in the United States during its first four years, so let's say 200,000 total. PS:T sold less than 100,000 copies worldwide.

It's not that this core audience went away, it simply was never very large to begin with.

So when Tyranny sells 300,000 copies, that's kind of par for the course. I expect Deadfire will do better than that, but nowhere near as well as PoE1. The idea that Baldur's Gate or Baldur's Gate 2 should be the benchmark for isometric RPGs was always kind of silly.

 

[FreeKaner]

There are more people that play games now than then, especially outside of US, in fact it's not even comparable. You could say most of the new blood for video gaming is the audience for mainstream games and you would be correct. I would say percentage of people who play cRPGs even got reduced over the years, but the total amount shouldn't have. There should be basically in ratio fewer people playing more (now) niche genres but more of them in total. Sure the initial hype of kickstarter probably caught a lot of people that are not interested in these type of games and will probably never play them again, but sales in 100k-200k for a game of this budget and magnitude is a disaster.

 

[Bigg Boss]

Then there are the RPG fans that are sick to fucking death of generic fantasy and won't buy PoE, Tyranny, or whatever generic shit they come up with next. I'm tired of fucking fireballs and elves dudes. I was tired of it 20 or so years ago when Baldur's Gate 2 came out.

 

[imweasel]

It was a miracle that the Baldur's Gate games sold so well, but even then the first Baldur's Gate only moved about half a million units in its first two years (yeah, PoE has sold better than BG over the first few years after release).

Nope. Interplay was expecting to sell something 150K copies of Baldur's Gate, yet they sold well over a million copies in a short period of time. It was a huge hit.

The Baldur's Gate series went on to sell over 5 million units.

 

[Safav Hamon]

Then there are the RPG fans that are sick to fucking death of generic fantasy and won't buy PoE, Tyranny, or whatever generic shit they come up with next. I'm tired of fucking fireballs and elves dudes. I was tired of it 20 or so years ago when Baldur's Gate 2 came out.

How are they generic fantasy? Tyranny is set in the Bronze Age, which to my knowledge has never been done before, and POE2: Deadfire is set in a colonial Polynesian setting, which also to my knowledge has never been done before. Even the first Pillars of Eternity had the souls and reincarnation stuff going for it, which I thought was pretty unique. What other RPG has reincarnation as a major theme?

 

[Bigg Boss]

It was a miracle that the Baldur's Gate games sold so well, but even then the first Baldur's Gate only moved about half a million units in its first two years (yeah, PoE has sold better than BG over the first few years after release).

Nope. Interplay was expecting to sell something 150K copies of Baldur's Gate, yet they sold well over a million copies in a short period of time. It was a huge hit.

The Baldur's Gate series went on to sell over 5 million units.

Yeah, a hit in niche RPG terms. At least I think that was their point.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

It was a miracle that the Baldur's Gate games sold so well, but even then the first Baldur's Gate only moved about half a million units in its first two years (yeah, PoE has sold better than BG over the first few years after release).

Nope. Interplay was expecting to sell something 150K copies of Baldur's Gate, yet they sold well over a million copies in a short period of time. It was a huge hit.

The Baldur's Gate series went on to sell over 5 million units.

I must have been looking at the U.S. numbers. Even so, the first BG had sold between 1 million and 1.5 million copies by the time SoA released in late 2000 (1 million is where it was at the end of 1999, 1.5 at the end of 2001). PoE had sold a bit more than a million by the time its sequel released. I doubt it will have the same kind of staying power, but my point is that PoE already hit the ceiling for a RTwP isometric RPG.

I actually like Deadfire but Sawyer clearly does not understand why BG and its sequel were so successful. It wasn’t for the variety of builds or spells or for the systems or for the quest design. It was the super reactive, super cartoonish companions. Hence BioWare’s subsequent financial success making simpler and simpler romance simulators. If Deadfire continues to have lackluster sales it will be because the first game didn’t have any memorable companions. And by memorable I mostly just mean silly catchphrases. I remember Minsc’s barks from nearly twenty years ago, but I can’t recall anything like that from PoE, which I last played like two weeks ago.

 

[Bigg Boss]

Then there are the RPG fans that are sick to fucking death of generic fantasy and won't buy PoE, Tyranny, or whatever generic shit they come up with next. I'm tired of fucking fireballs and elves dudes. I was tired of it 20 or so years ago when Baldur's Gate 2 came out.

How are they generic fantasy? Tyranny is set in the Bronze Age, which to my knowledge has never been done before, and POE2: Deadfire is set in a colonial Polynesian setting, which also to my knowledge has never been done before. Even the first Pillars of Eternity had the souls and reincarnation stuff going for it, which I thought was pretty unique. What other RPG has reincarnation as a major theme?

Motherfucking Planescape Torment. How is Bronze Age any different? Also how is it edgy to dislike faggotry over and over again? Bronze age...gotta be fucking kidding me.

Never saw them things before guys. So unique.

 

[aweigh]

 

[Riddler]

Completion rates I posted in another thread, with D:OS2 up to date (8.5%->9.8% since January):

• Mass Effect 2: 56%
• South Park: Stick of Truth: 47%
• Mass Effect 3: 42%
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution: 37.2%
• Dragon Age: Origins: 36%
• Dark Souls 2: 33%
• Deus Ex: Mankind Divided: 32.4%
• Skyrim: 32%
• The Witcher 3: 26.5%
• Fallout 4: 25.2%
• The Witcher 2: 18.9%
• Invisible, Inc: 18.9%
• The Banner Saga: 16.4%
• Tides of Numenera: 14.4%
• Dragon’s Dogma: 12.1% (2.8% twice)
• Legend of Grimrock: 10.3%
• Pillars of Eternity: 10.2%
• Divinity: Original Sin 2: 9.8%
• Legend of Grimrock 2: 8.3%
• Blackguards: 7.6%
• Divinity: Original Sin: 6.6%
• Expeditions: Conquistador: 5.1%
• Darkest Dungeon: 2.1%

Some games have an achievement for each different ending, so I did some estimates ranging from 1-30% of players doing more than one ending, capped at pre-ending achievements if available:

FNV: 17-24% (19-27% if you only include players who got past Doc Mitchell)
Dark Souls 3: 30-37%
Tyranny: 20-27%
Wasteland 2: 5-6%
Shadowrun Dragonfall: 11-15%
Shadowrun Hong Kong: 25-33%
[Note: BioWare released their own numbers and included consoles]

There are 2 editions of Divinity: Original Sin(Classic and Enhanced), and the achievements do not carry over. Summing both up(6.4%+7.1%=13.5%) is probably a more accurate estimation of it's completion rate.

That is not how percentages work man...

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

Then there are the RPG fans that are sick to fucking death of generic fantasy and won't buy PoE, Tyranny, or whatever generic shit they come up with next. I'm tired of fucking fireballs and elves dudes. I was tired of it 20 or so years ago when Baldur's Gate 2 came out.

How are they generic fantasy? Tyranny is set in the Bronze Age, which to my knowledge has never been done before, and POE2: Deadfire is set in a colonial Polynesian setting, which also to my knowledge has never been done before. Even the first Pillars of Eternity had the souls and reincarnation stuff going for it, which I thought was pretty unique. What other RPG has reincarnation as a major theme?

Motherfucking Planescape Torment. How is Bronze Age any different? Also how is it edgy to dislike faggotry over and over again? Bronze age...gotta be fucking kidding me.

The unique thing about Tyranny’s setting is less the Bronze Age to Iron Age transition (although I really liked that as a theme), and more the central “evil empire has won and you work for the dark lord” premise. That was definitely unique for a CRPG. You also had a bunch of crazy landscapes warped by crazy magic. And you had some cool looking characters who often seemed reminiscent of figures who’d be right at home in Planescape: Graven Ashe, The Voices of Nerat, Bleden Mark, Tunon, even Barik in his suit and Sirin with her headgear.

Anyway, if your bar for an interesting setting is PS:T, not many RPGs even come close. Maybe MOTB. Maybe Fallout. Maybe Arcanum. Maybe Tides of Numenera (for all its flaws, the premise behind the setting was very original and the Bloom in particular was even more out there than Sigil).

Deadfire also does something different; the whole archipelago and all of the nautical/pirate stuff. Plus, the world of Deadfire is about halfway between The Forgotten Realms and Arcanum in terms of technological development. You rarely see a 16th or 17th century style fantasy world. But, sure, it still has elves and dwarves and pseudo-hobbitses.

 

[FreeKaner]

Early modern period fantasy RPG is definitely rare, the biggest and most common fantasy and fantasy inspirations are medieval. Only Warhammer Fantasy is early modern period and it doesn't have any RPGs. The whole world exploration and colonisation aspect of early modern period is mindblowingly untouched.

 

[J_C]

I think marketing has played a huge role. Paradox pushed PoE a lot more than the current publisher has pushed PoE2. Add to that the whole Kickstarter thing (vs. Fig) being a PR machine in itself.
It's obviously not the only answer, but I think it's a major factor.

Their current publisher was shit, no doubt about it. Thinking about it, they didn't even have a good, bombastic trailer, which started the juices flowing. And that is game marketing 101. Even their launch trailer was shit. How did they expect to get people excited for this game?

 

[Bigg Boss]

Then there are the RPG fans that are sick to fucking death of generic fantasy and won't buy PoE, Tyranny, or whatever generic shit they come up with next. I'm tired of fucking fireballs and elves dudes. I was tired of it 20 or so years ago when Baldur's Gate 2 came out.

How are they generic fantasy? Tyranny is set in the Bronze Age, which to my knowledge has never been done before, and POE2: Deadfire is set in a colonial Polynesian setting, which also to my knowledge has never been done before. Even the first Pillars of Eternity had the souls and reincarnation stuff going for it, which I thought was pretty unique. What other RPG has reincarnation as a major theme?

Motherfucking Planescape Torment. How is Bronze Age any different? Also how is it edgy to dislike faggotry over and over again? Bronze age...gotta be fucking kidding me.

The unique thing about Tyranny’s setting is less the Bronze Age to Iron Age transition (although I really liked that as a theme), and more the central “evil empire has won and you work for the dark lord” premise. That was definitely unique for a CRPG. You also had a bunch of crazy landscapes warped by crazy magic. And you had some cool looking characters who often seemed reminiscent of figures who’d be right at home in Planescape: Graven Ashe, The Voices of Nerat, Bleden Mark, Tunon, even Barik in his suit and Sirin with her headgear.

Anyway, if your bar for an interesting setting is PS:T, not many RPGs even come close. Maybe MOTB. Maybe Fallout. Maybe Arcanum. Maybe Tides of Numenera (for all its flaws, the premise behind the setting was very original and the Bloom in particular was even more out there than Sigil).

Deadfire also does something different; the whole archipelago and all of the nautical/pirate stuff. Plus, the world of Deadfire is about halfway between The Forgotten Realms and Arcanum in terms of technological development. You rarely see a 16th or 17th century style fantasy world. But, sure, it still has elves and dwarves and pseudo-hobbitses.

Arcanum I am saving for a rainy day and Fallout is my favorite RPG. I see the appeal in 17th century stuff, but the last line is the killer for me. Deadlands, World of Darkness, Lovecraft, superheros, surreal Alice in Wonderland style something or another....the possibilities are endless. But no it's Elves and Dwarves. I would love just once for them to switch the Elves and Dwarves out with something different. Every genre has it's tropes but truly unique movies/games/novels buck trends and evolve. I hate Bioware but at least Jade Empire and Mass Effect were a little different.

These concepts I just threw out there are supposedly hard to pitch to publishers but Kickstarter was supposed to change all that. Now I know some small devs are working on at least one or two of the ideas I threw out but Obsidian has some talent and reputation and they waste it on this shit. Isometric RPG's are stuck on concepts from the 90's namely Baldur's Gate and to a lesser extent Fallout/Planescape.

I rant on this too often, but I am starved for entertainment and the supposed saviors of RPG's are making the same old shit with a new coat of paint. I beg you developers out there lurking to tell your boss next time he suggests "Hey guys Elves and Dwarves innnnnn sppppppppace" to shut the fuck up and fire their kids before they ruin more good games. I don't have much more time on this Earth so I would like to play some games before I die.

A Sunless Sea/Fallen London isometric RPG would be nice. My luck it would be a Diablo clone or something.

 

[FreeKaner]

Urban fantasy, we need urban fantasy.

TorontRayne I agree with you that generic fantasy has became overdone 20 years ago already but I don't think there is much boat exploring in colonies with guns and ships fantasy out there.