Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous has sold a million copies - A stellar or abysmal performance?

[Jarmaro]

Earlier today I stumbled upon two similar news articles that left me quite baffled.

The first spoke about a 'stellar' results of P:WOTR sales:

After rolling onto screens across PC and console in 2021, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous has shifted over 1 Million copies worldwide. Now available across PC, Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch (cloud version), the success of this incredible tale is no real surprise. After a hyped Kickstarter campaign that raised $ 2,054,339, the game garnered popular praise and a stunning 9.5 score here at Gamespace.

The game was released in a buggy, problematic state, yet the overall ratings and player feedback was overwhelmingly positive. Not to mention WOTR was financed on Kickstarter - players actively helped to fund the game.
Normaly I'd simply see these numbers and merely be surprised that a game so popular managed to acomplish only a pitiful one million of sales.

However, soon after I saw a far more surprising news:




Sons Of The Forest is another game from the creators of The Forest - a survival open-world with optional co-op. It managed to sell two million copies within just 24 hours. A result that is obviously amazing, but the difference in what is considered to 'amazing' when talking about one of the biggest western RPG releases of the last few years and an Early-Access survival games is saddening. I've always known RPGs are somewhat niche these days, but the difference between these two numbers is like between Heaven and Earth.

As a bonus, I checked Underrail sales: 198k sales since the game was released 8 years ago.


Am I being weird by being surprised by these numbers? Not having a mainstream appeal is one thing, being utterly out-classed is another. I'm not mad at Sons Of The Forest; the developers have obviously put a lot of work into it. But the difference between the complexity and sophistication between these two games is extreme. Now I feel like RPG genre is barely scraping by.

 

[Abu Antar]

One is following trends: open world survival, with online co-op.

The other one is a fairly niche computer rpg.

 

[Melcar]

Different types of games have different kinds of audiences obviously. Early Access numbers are always fudged too.

 

[StrongBelwas]

Comparing Apples and Oranges: The Thread.
Would comparing the difference in sales between say, Tomb Raider II or Final Fantasy VII ,to Fallout make any more sense?

 

[Delterius]

The game was released in a buggy, problematic state, yet the overall ratings and player feedback was overwhelmingly positive.

you're in a website founded by fans of 'buggy piece of shit with good ideas i guess'

 

[Roguey]

A million copies for a pseudo-iso party-based RPG is great. See: The Volournian million-or-bust-challenge from the mid-10s.

 

[luj1]

and why is this important? skyrim sold 60 million, its still trash

copies sold isnt a metric for quality, only for marketing

 

[ropetight]

Just for comparison see how Pillars 2 did.
Much better comparison than with multiplayer open world survival:
both single player iso RPGs
both sequels of fairly successful first entry in franchise
Both made couple of millions in crowdfunding

There were lots of talk about "below expectations" sales, There is a strong doubt Pillars 2 sold over half a million.
I.e.
https://www.gamewatcher.com/news/pillars-of-eternity-2-sales

 

[Jarmaro]

Just for comparison see how Pillars 2 did.
Much better comparison than with multiplayer open world survival:
both single player iso RPGs
both sequels of fairly successful first entry in franchise
Both made couple of millions in crowdfunding

To be fair, all I have heard indicates Pillars 2 had abysmal marketing. PoE 1 was bloated shit, but people liked it, so it could easily ride that popularity into the sequel. WotR was being hyped from the start and 'succeeded'.

 

[Roguey]

Just for comparison see how Pillars 2 did.

Deadfire eventually made a profit.

399.3 k .. 958.3 k on reviews
~1.14 M by PlayTracker
~643.5 k by VG Insights
~935.0 k by SteamSpy

Close enough to a million.

 

[Delterius]

Just for comparison see how Pillars 2 did.

Deadfire eventually made a profit.

399.3 k .. 958.3 k on reviews
~1.14 M by PlayTracker
~643.5 k by VG Insights
~935.0 k by SteamSpy

Close enough to a million.

Josh did say that Deadfire had 'long legs'. It didn't sell well on release probably because 'pirate setting' and probably because their marketing strategy seems to mostly involve just using Critical Role.

In any case 1 million copies sold on the release months seem to be the golden ticket for these projects. I mean, Owlcat is even considering a third season of DLC if season 2 does well enough. How large are these dev teams even?

 

[BrotherFrank]

Which game is more friendly to zoomer streamers and their audience which like it or not make up a bigger proportion of gamers then relics like us : the sequel to an open world survival game with coop and no shortage of opportunities for catchy thumbnails or an 80 hour crpg with lots and lots of reading?

The maths are depressing but on reflection it makes sense, also the forest/sons of the forest is much cheaper then wotr or even just kingmaker which lowers the entry barrier considerably.

 

[Roguey]

How large are these dev teams even?

Core team is around 60 for both.

 

[Delterius]

How large are these dev teams even?

Core team is around 60 for both.

So the gist of it is that the expenditures aren't absurd and the bottom line gets even better if you can consistently get the designers, producers, writers, and art people constantly working on the next game. Even better if you work from a country with a lower cost of living.

 

[Desiderius]

Sons of the Forest looks like Skyrim clone.

D:OS 3 will be better comp but has much higher cost structure.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

A million copies for a pseudo-iso party-based RPG is great.

Didn't Baldur's Gate sell 2 million shortly after release back in the day?

BG3 also sold a million in its first week, and it wasn't even a finished game.

 

[InD_ImaginE]

Sons of the forest is open world survival game whose predecessor is BIG on Twitch and streaming in general. You are talking about like most mainstream streamer have played The Forest solo or on multiplayer with subs or even both.

The other one is CRPG essentially a niche genre. It's kinda retarded to compare the sales of the two. That they sell 1 million in 1.3 years is pretty amazing.

Owlcat has pretty much stopped using KS (they have pre order on their website but this shows that it doesn't depends on global visibility of KS anymore) which means they are more or less financially secure after WOTR. They are speedrunning into becoming modern Bioware with developing AAA action rpg now based on job listing.

 

[PapaPetro]

 

[Roguey]

Didn't Baldur's Gate sell 2 million shortly after release back in the day?

Over time, not shortly. It reached a million after around two years.

BG3 also sold a million in its first week, and it wasn't even a finished game.

That has more to do with Larian building up its reputation and sales with D:OS and D:OS 2.

Skyrim sold tens of millions, but that doesn't mean just any open world RPG is also going to do those numbers (and they don't).

 

[StrongBelwas]

Didn't Baldur's Gate sell 2 million shortly after release back in the day?

After two years maybe.
https://web.archive.org/web/20021207211601/http://www.bioware.com/bioware_info/about/
"

• Baldur’s Gate II: Shadows of Amn, was released in Sept. 2000 and continued the award winning story line of the Baldur’s Gate series, selling nearly 1.5 million units so far"

-December 2002

BG3 also sold a million in its first week, and it wasn't even a finished game.

Larian is basically the dominant independent RPG creator as it stands, the team for BG3 numbers in the hundreds and its fully voice acted with probably the most technically advanced visuals of any cRPG out there. Its an entirely different league.

 

[rojay]

Which game is more friendly to zoomer streamers and their audience which like it or not make up a bigger proportion of gamers then relics like us : the sequel to an open world survival game with coop and no shortage of opportunities for catchy thumbnails or an 80 hour crpg with lots and lots of reading?

The maths are depressing but on reflection it makes sense, also the forest/sons of the forest is much cheaper then wotr or even just kingmaker which lowers the entry barrier considerably.

There's a market for games like Wrath and even if it's not as big a market as for other games it's big enough that developers will keep making these sorts of games. Maybe Owlcat will go full Bungie and sell out to Microsoft but if that happens I'm guessing there are a few other developers who'll step into that lane.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

Over time, not shortly. It reached a million after around two years.

Are you sure you're not thinking of US sales?

It was released in September 2000, and the archive StrongBelwas posted shows it at 1.5 million by Dec 2002, but there's no real date on that. It's just when they updated with their About page, or else when the archiver noticed it was updated. Before that they were just totaling it with the combined sales of the series, which totaled at over 4 million copies within the 4 years since BG1's release. That's one million sales per year. BG2 likely surpassed one million worldwide within its first year - or just short of it, which would explain why they didn't announce the milestone.

Baldur's Gate was also at roughly one million sales worldwide within its first year btw.

Wrath of the Tranny been out since 2021. That's over a year, and in a market with more RPG players worldwide than ever. I would have expected at least twice those sales by now.

After two years maybe.

This is reasonable, though according to wikipedo, now that I check, it wasn't until 2005 where there was any sort of announcement of BG2 passing 2 million copies. Which again, I doubt, since it's just when the webguy at Bioware updated the About page with whatever info that was however old at the time.

Larian is basically the dominant independent RPG creator as it stands, the team for BG3 numbers in the hundreds and its fully voice acted with probably the most technically advanced visuals of any cRPG out there. Its an entirely different league.

So the only reason a million people preordered the first week was for voice acting etc.? In a sequel to a series that probably had equivalent voice acting (in amount) to Wrath of the Tranny? Not buying it.

Probably more to do with brand recognition, and the fact that Tranny was notoriously buggy on release.

 

[deuxhero]

As a fan of Kingmaker, I was turned off from Wrath of the Righteous from the second they announced it was Wrath of the Righteous and will never buy it. It's just plain old not a good plot, and it's dragged down even further by the shit that is Mythic. These were confirmed to still be true by Early Access. I fully recommend Kingmaker to people, but (again) will actively steer them away from Wrath of the Righteous. My opinion that the writing is a shitshow and mythic making enemies bags of HP and immunities does not appear to be a minority, so it's no wonder sales have been comparatively slow.

 

[Bester]

It didn't sell well on release probably because 'pirate setting'

It didn't sell well, because only like 10% of poe1 owners finished poe1. That's how many people wanted more of that turd.

The pirate setting has nothing to do with it. You can make an RPG out of any setting. It makes zero difference.

 

[ShaggyMoose]

Multiplayer games always take off in sales numbers more quickly because the network effect is far stronger.