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[Mayar]

US asleep and us euro-bros are at work, so makes sense, weird that it is still that high/

And only farmers seem to never sleep

 

[GymWolf]

They cooked for 7 years if they started work after Andromeda. If after Inquisition, 10 years. When you cooked for that long, the game that comes out, naturally, was COOKED. Bioware too, by extension, is COOKED.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Meanwhile, the 20th Anniversary Patch for Half-Life 2

 

[nowhat]

Best Accessibility Options in a Game is a coveted, proud, and respectable category that will be remembered for generations

Yes, I smell the sarcasm from a mile - nay, kilometer, fuck imperial - away, but accessibility options are a legit good thing. Nowadays, if there's an accessibility menu I always go through it, there may be options that I enjoy even though I may not be the target audience. Like turning button mashing into a long press, because button mashing is the lamest QTE and I don't want to ruin my controller.

Whether Veilguard is a valid candidate, I cannot tell. Haven't played it, will probably try it after it's on deep discount. But having accessibility options, and rewarding games for having them, is a Good Thing™. This comment may attract the "git gud" crowd, but if the option is there, that doesn't mean you have to use it.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Bottomed out in the 7,000s. Like any game, weekends spike up gamers, but comes crashing down during weekdays.

Should hit 5,000 by next week.

 

[MMaRsu]

Accessibility Options are great. There is 0 need to shit on that.

 

[Dynasty8]

Accessibility Options are great. There is 0 need to shit on that.

Unless when they force it into a game and don't give the option to turn it off. GoW Ragnarok did that with the "hints" during puzzles.

I am all for the other accessibility stuff like colorblind options and text enhancements, etc.

 

[Kacho]

Yeah. The colorblind mode in Borderlands was great for me.

 

[Humdinger]

Not that it necessarily means much but I asked chatGPT 4o this question last week, in regards a fictional game (but had veil guard in mind)...Initially I asked for numbers just based on game budget estimates (which we've been guessing at based on team size, number of years, and the typical AAA costs these days):
"If we're excluding marketing, we'll focus on the development cost of $200 to $250 million. To find the break-even point, we should consider the price of a game, typically around $60. However, not all that money goes to the developer; they might get around 50% after retailer cuts, distribution, and other expenses, so about $30 per game.

To cover $200 million in costs, they'd need to sell around 6.67 million copies ($200 million divided by $30 per game). For the $250 million mark, it would be around 8.33 million copies. These are rough estimates, and the actual number could be higher or lower."

I then asked for it to consider the marketing costs too.

"
For a heavily marketed game by a top publisher, marketing budgets are often as large as, or even exceed, development costs. Let’s assume a marketing budget matching the high end of development—around $250 million. This would bring total costs to about $500 million ($250 million for development + $250 million for marketing).

Break-even Calculations:​

1. Revenue per Game Sold:
   • Game price = $60, but the developer's net revenue after distribution and retailer cuts is typically around $30 per game.
2. Copies Required to Break Even:
   • At $500 million in costs, the break-even point would be:500 million/30=16.67 million copies500 million/30=16.67 million copies

Summary:​

To break even on a game with $250 million in development costs and $250 million in marketing, the publisher would need to sell approximately 16.67 million copies at an average net revenue of $30 per game.

In reality, the break-even point could vary due to factors like discounts, collector’s editions, and additional revenue streams (e.g., DLCs, microtransactions)."

Probably better than back of the envelope numbers, but could be wildly wrong. Either way if I had to guess id say the break even sales needed that most people are throwing around are likely much too conservative, and it needed to not only be a massive sustained hit, but that it wouldn't breakeven even under that rosey scenario until many years later on long tail sales. They just spent way way too much and took far too long to ship. All opinion tho until we get a leak directly related to the financials...they do seem very leaky right now, so I guess we might...and the flood gates could open more if and when the studio is closed.

Interesting. Thanks for running those calculations. I think the estimate for marketing (250 million) is too high, though. I've heard that DA:V's marketing budget was in the arena of 60 or 80 million. I suspect that Bioware knew it wasn't going to be a money machine (to put it nicely) and so they didn't go all-in on marketing.

 

[mdkirby]

Interesting. Thanks for running those calculations. I think the estimate for marketing is too high, though. I've heard that DA:V's marketing budget was in the arena of 60 or 80K. I suspect that Bioware knew it wasn't going to be a money machine (to put it nicely) and so they didn't go all-in on marketing.

I assume you mean 60-80 mil. You’d spaff 80k in a heartbeat.

And I’m not so sure; it was pretty heavily marketed from what I saw.

 

[Humdinger]

I assume you mean 60-80 mil. You’d spaff 80k in a heartbeat.

Oops, I should've said m, not k. I'll correct it.

 

[Novaex]

Why are people saying it didn't have a big marketing budget? I don't remember the last game that spammed twitch and reddit ads for months. I'm still getting both. Saw three! twitch ads yesterday and I was wacthing twitch for less than 2 hours. I assume youtube is the same, though I have a working adblocker there so I can't confirm. But these constant ads won't be cheap....

 

[Stuart360]

It did solid. Whether solid is enough for EA is another matter. Dont let games like Wukong, and Hogwarts etc skew your view, most standard AAA games on Steam launch in the 40-80k concurrent range. Now whether a AAA game like Dragons Age, with a following behind it, should do 'standard' AAA numbers, well thats another question.

In the end the game will be seen as a moderate hit i'm sure, but again if thats enough then thats another question. I'm sure Bioware will survie though, at least until after the next Mass Effect anyway.

 

[DonkeyPunchJr]

It did solid. Whether solid is enough for EA is another matter. Dont let games like Wukong, and Hogwarts etc skew your view, most standard AAA games on Steam launch in the 40-80k concurrent range. Now whether a AAA game like Dragons Age, with a following behind it, should do 'standard' AAA numbers, well thats another question.

In the end the game will be seen as a moderate hit i'm sure, but again if thats enough then thats another question. I'm sure Bioware will survie though, at least until after the next Mass Effect anyway.

Is 40k-80k the “standard AAA” range?

That seems really low for a AAA game launching on Steam in 2024. For comparison, it’s about 40% of what Dragon’s Dogma 2 did, or about the same as Metaphor: Refantazio.

I can’t imagine that’s anywhere even close to what EA was expecting for this game. They didn’t spend the better part of a decade and hundreds of millions developing a sequel to their best selling game just to sell a couple million copies (and no DLC)

 

[dorkimoe]

Started this game this weekend. I like the art style a lot and the combat is pretty fun

 

[Humdinger]

Why are people saying it didn't have a big marketing budget?

You'd have to ask them. I am just passing on something I heard. I don't even remember where. It may be completely baseless, who knows. I was just saying that the estimate of a 250 million marketing budget mdkirby used was too high.

 

[Stuart360]

Is 40k-80k the “standard AAA” range?

That seems really low for a AAA game launching on Steam in 2024. For comparison, it’s about 40% of what Dragon’s Dogma 2 did, or about the same as Metaphor: Refantazio.

I can’t imagine that’s anywhere even close to what EA was expecting for this game. They didn’t spend the better part of a decade and hundreds of millions developing a sequel to their best selling game just to sell a couple million copies (and no DLC)

If you have some spare time do you own resaerch. A standard AAA game concurrent players at launch is often under 100k. Now i'm talking like a none mega hyped AAA game years in the waiting, just like a standard moderately hyped game.
These mega hits getting 300k, 400k, even 800k at launch, that is NOT normality for a AAA game on Steam. Even some big MP shooters barely reach those numbers at their peak (but some do, much more than SP games to be fair).

Thing with Steam is there are so many games to chose from, and so many that have decent sized playerbases, that sometimes a game can look like its not doing as good as you would think. Thats why people talk about early sales of a new game are stronger on console, but drop off big after like a couple of weeks. While on Steam, they usually start lower, but get consistent sales for weeks, and sometimes months after launch.

 

[DonkeyPunchJr]

If you have some spare time do you own resaerch. A standard AAA game concurrent players at launch is often under 100k. Now i'm talking like a none mega hyped AAA game years in the waiting, just like a standard moderately hyped game.
These mega hits getting 300k, 400k, even 800k at launch, that is NOT normality for a AAA game on Steam. Even some big MP shooters barely reach those numbers at their peak (but some do, much more than SP games to be fair).

I just did my research and gave you 2 examples of recent games that launched simultaneously on Steam and console. If you think you have a better example, then YOU do your research and let us know.

Thing with Steam is there are so many games to chose from, and so many that have decent sized playerbases, that sometimes a game can look like its not doing as good as you would think. Thats why people talk about early sales of a new game are stronger on console, but drop off big after like a couple of weeks. While on Steam, they usually start lower, but get consistent sales for weeks, and sometimes months after launch.

Not true. Nearly every single player game on Steam hits its all time CCU count on its first Sunday then steadily declines. The exceptions are the big megaton evergreen games or games that were under hyped but got tons of positive buzz after release.

Veilguard is following this very predictable pattern. Unless it gets a massive discount it’s going to keep following that pattern (notice it peaks each week on Sunday):

 

[FunkMiller]

Meanwhile, the 20th Anniversary Patch for Half-Life 2

It is fucking brilliant in VR. Playing through it again makes me realise just how far game development has fallen.

 

[Stuart360]

I just did my research and gave you 2 examples of recent games that launched simultaneously on Steam and console. If you think you have a better example, then YOU do your research and let us know.

Not true. Nearly every single player game on Steam hits its all time CCU count on its first Sunday then steadily declines. The exceptions are the big megaton evergreen games or games that were under hyped but got tons of positive buzz after release.

Veilguard is following this very predictable pattern. Unless it gets a massive discount it’s going to keep following that pattern (notice it peaks each week on Sunday):

I think you're under the impression i'm defending Dragon Age, well i'm not lol. I wont even pirate the game, even though i was a fan of the other games. So yeah no need for the defensive posture, i'm right there with you.
And i also wasnt trying to be a dick when i said 'do you own research', i was being serious. You might be surprised by some of the numbers you see for some games.
Again multiple hundreds of thousands peak is not the norm on Steam. You maybe get 3 or 4 games a year (sp) that get that range, and thats maybe pushing it.

 

[TheChumpNation]

I think you're under the impression i'm defending Dragon Age, well i'm not lol. I wont even pirate the game, even though i was a fan of the other games. So yeah no need for the defensive posture, i'm right there with you.
And i also wasnt trying to be a dick when i said 'do you own research', i was being serious. You might be surprised by some of the numbers you see for some games.
Again multiple hundreds of thousands peak is not the norm on Steam. You maybe get 3 or 4 games a year (sp) that get that range, and thats maybe pushing it.

If it peaks at the 84k concurrent users it hit on Saturday, which seems likely, that puts it in the same ballpark as games like Far Cry 5, Dark Souls II, and Need for Speed Heat. I tried to pick games that I thought would have a somewhat similar PC/console split. I've pulled the idea that these three games fit that criteria entirely out of my ass.

- Far Cry 5 sold 10m+ apparently (no idea if that accounts for discounts in any way)
- In 2015, Dark Souls II had sold about 3m units, with a little more than 1m on PC
- NFS Heat apparently sold slightly lower than what EA projected, which was 3-4m total.

Veilguard's 84k is also very close to pretty much every edition of Football Manager, which seems to sell in the 1-3m range. Again, I'm gleaning this from some quick googling so take it all with a massive grain of salt.

Overall it seems like Veilguard could be headed towards sales in the 3-5m range which is probably a disappointment compared to EA's hopes/expectations, but not a complete disaster. Unless it does a Far Cry 5, which I guess must have done gangbusters on consoles or something.

Some random analysis from a few days after launch.

I do think the 3-5m lifetime sales call continues to seem reasonable given what we've learned since.

 

[DonkeyPunchJr]

I think you're under the impression i'm defending Dragon Age, well i'm not lol. I wont even pirate the game, even though i was a fan of the other games. So yeah no need for the defensive posture, i'm right there with you.
And i also wasnt trying to be a dick when i said 'do you own research', i was being serious. You might be surprised by some of the numbers you see for some games.
Again multiple hundreds of thousands peak is not the norm on Steam. You maybe get 3 or 4 games a year (sp) that get that range, and thats maybe pushing it.

I’m looking at AAA RPGs from this generation that launched simultaneously on Steam and console. Cyberpunk 2077, Elden Ring, Dragon’s Dogma 2, Starfield, Baldur’s Gate 3… all of them did well into the hundreds of thousands CCU. (And that’s despite Starfield launching on Gamepass and DD2 probably stretching the definition of “AAA”)

What recent-ish AAA game, that launched on Steam and consoles simultaneously, do you think is a more fair comparison? I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about.

 

[TheChumpNation]

I’m looking at AAA RPGs from this generation that launched simultaneously on Steam and console. Cyberpunk 2077, Elden Ring, Dragon’s Dogma 2, Starfield, Baldur’s Gate 3… all of them did well into the hundreds of thousands CCU. (And that’s despite Starfield launching on Gamepass and DD2 probably stretching the definition of “AAA”)

What recent-ish AAA game, that launched on Steam and consoles simultaneously, do you think is a more fair comparison? I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about.

Even if you downgrade from the big hitters that you mentioned (I agree Veilguard would be hoping to do numbers like those games, but let's be extra charitable to really prove the point)...

TW: Warhammer 3 - 166k
Armored Core 6 - 156k
Stalker 2 - 121k
Doom Eternal - 104k
Resident Evil 8 - 106k
Dark Souls 3 - 130k
The Division - 114k
Remnant II - 110k

There's no chance in hell that EA will be satisfied with numbers below Remnant II. Veilguard probably had a higher marketing budget than all of the above.

A number of those came out quite awhile ago as well, and Steam (and the gaming market generally) has grown significantly since.

 

[Hawk The Slayer]

Even if you downgrade from the big hitters that you mentioned (I agree Veilguard would be hoping to do numbers like those games, but let's be extra charitable to really prove the point)...

TW: Warhammer 3 - 166k
Armored Core 6 - 156k
Stalker 2 - 121k
Doom Eternal - 104k
Resident Evil 8 - 106k
Dark Souls 3 - 130k
The Division - 114k
Remnant II - 110k

There's no chance in hell that EA will be satisfied with numbers below Remnant II. Veilguard probably had a higher marketing budget than all of the above.

A number of those came out quite awhile ago as well, and Steam (and the gaming market generally) has grown significantly since.

Yep and being a huge budget Western RPG game, the CCP should really be higher than 300k CCP at the very least. Which would have happened if not for the shitty stuff and writing they decided to push for the game.

 

[KimDongHwan]

Yep and being a huge budget Western RPG game, the CCP should really be higher than 200k CCP at the very least. Which would have happened if not for the shitty stuff and writing they decided to push for the game.

That's what I am saying as well. Imagine the entire dev team spending 5+ years of their lifes programming what seems to be a decent game and having it being hurt just by some minority inside the studio wanting to publish their agenda. Even for people that say "most gamers dont care about this stuff", even if there is a third of gamers caring about that stuff is already a lot to risk just to appease that internal minority.

 

[Guilty_AI]

This thread is bigger than the game already