• ampersandrew@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Baldur’s Gate 3 was only last year. Metaphor just set records for Atlas’ fastest selling game this year. Even amidst the tremendously troubled launch, Cyberpunk 2077 went on to be one of the best-selling video games of all time, and its DLC did very well too. God of War: Ragnarok sold at least 15 million copies. And these are just a few examples off of the top of my head that don’t fall into gray areas like GTA where they’re also a live service.

      • ExcursionInversion@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        Those are are the exceptions not the normal case. Look at almost anything remedy has done. Great stories but bad sales. Alan Wake 2 was still not profitable in November.

        Meanwhile candy crush has generated more than 20 billion in revenue

        • ampersandrew@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          Alan Wake 2 took an upfront buyout in exchange for appearing on a less popular platform. That would be an exception to the normal use case. A thousand companies will go bankrupt trying to make Candy Crush even though someone already made Candy Crush. And you can replace Candy Crush with Call of Duty, World of WarCraft, Destiny, or whatever you like. Those games take up all of your time by design rather than allowing and encouraging you to move on to another game.

    • idyllic_optimism@lemmy.today
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      3 days ago

      What doesn’t sell are the games that don’t have a well written story or well-written characters. Or the games that their developers themselves don’t have any passion or interest in, games just made to please shareholders… Or games that get preachy on issues without proper care…