9 hours ago, psolk said:

Show the numbers if you wouldn't mind...  GTA4 had like 3.5M PC sales lifetime compared to 200M console sales.  That's about the same ratio as 165M console to 2M PC.  On average the PC side is a rounding error compared to overall sales. 

ETS2 is not available on console and has a massive following on PC.  SCS have a cult like following.  I'm more than happy to believe that GTA V has sold 20M copies on PC as you state. just show me some evidence or proof please.  I can't seem to find anything to back your claim.  

If you look at the footnote on Wikipedia where the 2M figure is from, it is from an article on Forbes from May 1st 2015, which is two weeks after the PC launch. So that 2M figure is the PC sales figure for only the first two weeks. 7 years later, and with GTAV still being one of the most popular PC games that is still a Steam top 10 best seller when Steam has its yearly spring/summer/Christmas sale etc, then 2M is now a very, very low and outdated figure. That whole list on Wikipedia is based on a number of different sources from very different years, so it should not be read as an updated, comparative ranking of PC titles with their current sales figures in 2022.

Steam doesn't publish sales figues, and Rockstar hasn't published total PC sales figures for GTAV over the years. The 2M number in the Forbes article from 2015 is based on SteamSpy (check the link in the first paragraph in the Forbes article). SteamSpy tries to estimate sales figures based on concurrent players on Steam. That estimate was 2M after the first two weeks in May 2015. The current SteamSpy estimate of GTAV owners in 2022 is now the region of 20M - 50M: https://steamspy.com/app/271590 

So 2M is not a correct figure in 2022 according to the source that Wikipedia has used, so that 2M figure should not be used as a basis for concluding that PC gaming is a niche and a drop in the ocean.

49 minutes ago, JacquesBrel said:

If you look at the footnote on Wikipedia where the 2M figure is from, it is from an article on Forbes from May 1st 2015, which is two weeks after the PC launch. So that 2M figure is the PC sales figure for only the first two weeks. 7 years later, and with GTAV still being one of the most popular PC games that is still a Steam top 10 best seller when Steam has its yearly spring/summer/Christmas sale etc, then 2M is now a very, very low and outdated figure. That whole list on Wikipedia is based on a number of different sources from very different years, so it should not be read as an updated, comparative ranking of PC titles with their current sales figures in 2022.

Steam doesn't publish sales figues, and Rockstar hasn't published total PC sales figures for GTAV over the years. The 2M number in the Forbes article from 2015 is based on SteamSpy (check the link in the first paragraph in the Forbes article). SteamSpy tries to estimate sales figures based on concurrent players on Steam. That estimate was 2M after the first two weeks in May 2015. The current SteamSpy estimate of GTAV owners in 2022 is now the region of 20M - 50M: https://steamspy.com/app/271590 

So 2M is not a correct figure in 2022 according to the source that Wikipedia has used, so that 2M figure should not be used as a basis for concluding that PC gaming is a niche and a drop in the ocean.

So all of that is speculation and based on SteamSpy estimating there are 20-50M PC users?  They can't seem to narrow it down by 30M users to get a more accurate number?

Ok, let's say GTA has sold 20M PC copies total out of 370M copies total.  That would make it one of the top selling PC titles of all time and still less than 1/15 the total sales.  If it wasn't released on PC their sales would drop from 370M to 350M.    

I stand by my comment PC gaming is a niche market, it's a fraction of the console market.  

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by psolk

Would be really interesting to know actual numbers on this. My gut says the truth is probably somewhere between you two 

2 hours ago, psolk said:

So all of that is speculation and based on SteamSpy estimating there are 20-50M PC users?

To be fair, since he is getting his numbers from the same source you did, you'd have to call that 2M speculation as well. Also, I don't care how many units of GTAV sold on console, in the context of gaming as a whole, 20-50M is NOT niche.

2 hours ago, psolk said:

I stand by my comment PC gaming is a niche market.  

"Niche" is a subjective and relative term, but that's your assesment. I agree that GTAV is very much a console title, but in the overall gaming and entertainment market, I would definitely not consider PC gaming a niche market. PC-only free-to-play titles such as League of Legends and Counter-Strike have a massive following in streaming viewers on Twitch and YouTube and a very large presence in eSports. League of Legends sits at around 125M average monthly players: https://activeplayer.io/league-of-legends/ Counter-Strike has around 6-7x the amount of concurrent players on Steam than GTAV (which has GTA: Online as its free-to play online service) https://steamdb.info/app/730/graphs/ https://steamdb.info/app/271590/graphs/

A survey in 2018 found that around a third of Americans are PC gamers: https://playtoday.co/blog/stats/pc-gamer-demographics/ But at the end of the day, "niche" is subjective conclusion based on what statistics you decide are relevant, and there is no objective yardstick to measure what is niche and what is not. But when I look at the gaming industry I don't see a PC gaming segment that I would describe as niche.

34 minutes ago, Krakin said:

To be fair, since he is getting his numbers from the same source you did, you'd have to call that 2M speculation as well. Also, I don't care how many units of GTAV sold on console, in the context of gaming as a whole, 20-50M is NOT niche.

Maybe not "niche", but certainly not 'big' when compared to consoles.

Sales in 2021 only:
Nintendo Switch: 25 million

Sales since 2020 launch:
PS5: 18.7 million
Xbox: 13.9 million

Source: https://www.vgchartz.com/article/453293/ps5-vs-xbox-series-xs-sales-comparison-march-2022/

 

That's nearly 33 milllion units of the latest and greatest consoles in 18 months against all PCs ever using the most popular video game distribution platform.

For further comparison info, the PS4 sold 116 million units.
Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/651576/global-ps4-console-unit-sales/

2 hours ago, Krakin said:

To be fair, since he is getting his numbers from the same source you did, you'd have to call that 2M speculation as well. Also, I don't care how many units of GTAV sold on console, in the context of gaming as a whole, 20-50M is NOT niche.

How can you define something as niche without looking at in the full context?  And no one knows that GTAV is between 20-50M users. Mind you that is a disparity of more than 100% in their "range."  There is a HUGE range between what I cited as 2M and the 20M-50M cited.  Our sources were the same that they were both off the web but beyond that we used different sites/links.  If we both used the same source we'd probably both have the same data 🙂 

20M on it's own doesn't look niche, 20M relative to total sales of 370M does look niche despite it being a large number. 

BTW, we are totally debating semantics, I don't think anyone can deny the PC market is significantly smaller than the console market and the FS market is even smaller than the total PC market.  

And being niche isn't necessarily bad 🙂 

 

 

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by psolk

20 minutes ago, psolk said:

Our sources were the same that they were both off the web but beyond that we used different sites/links.

He clearly outlined that both sets of numbers came from SteamSpy. That's where Forbes got the 2M from. As he rightly pointed out, the information at the time was old. It should also be pointed out that the console versions had a two year head start on the PC version. Consoles are more mainstream but it doesn't make PC niche.

19 minutes ago, Krakin said:

He clearly outlined that both sets of numbers came from SteamSpy. That's where Forbes got the 2M from. As he rightly pointed out, the information at the time was old. It should also be pointed out that the console versions had a two year head start on the PC version. Consoles are more mainstream but it doesn't make PC niche.

I sit corrected!  Didn't realize Forbes had pulled their information from the same source.  Apologies.  

I am glad that I got MSFS from Steam, they're a good and stable platform. I've never had any issues.  Maybe only two CTD's that were actually probably caused by a 3rd party aircraft application. 

21 hours ago, psolk said:

 PC video gaming is niche... You only referenced PC/Mac/Linux video games.  As MSFS is XBox compatible look at it compared to other console releases. GTAV sold 165,000,000 copies overall, 2M on PC. #50 on that list including console video games is 20+Million copies... 

 So yes, PC gaming on a whole is niche, flight simulator is a niche within a niche.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games

 

I will never understand, why in this day and age of powerful GPUs, a game with this type of graphics is so popular when there are so many other options.

34 minutes ago, bofhlusr said:

I will never understand, why in this day and age of powerful GPUs, a game with this type of graphics is so popular when there are so many other options.

My guess is that it is simply a revolutionary graphic delight of the entire world, that nothing else can match, and also all the additional things that will come with it.

PC Gaming a niche market?

Yea Ok…🤣

Overall sales of….

GTA San Andreas

GTAV

Ubisoft FarCry Series

Origin Battlefield Series

Unreal Tournament Series

Blizzard Warcraft 123 & World Series

Blizzard Starcraft Series

Blizzard Diablo Series

Sims PC Series

Age of Empires Series

 Counter Strike Series

Half Life Series

Arma Series

Minecraft Series

Fortnite Series

Need for Speed Series

F1 & Rally Series Titles

Some of you do realize with the PC platform there are 15+ year old titles still being purchased everyday?

FSX 2006

World of Warcraft 2005

Counter Strike 1999

Unreal Tournament 1999

No console platform even comes close to such versatility of recurring sales.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by blueshark747

35 minutes ago, blueshark747 said:

PC Gaming a niche market?

Yea Ok…🤣

Overall sales of….

GTA San Andreas

GTAV

Ubisoft FarCry Series

Origin Battlefield Series

Blizzard Warcraft 123 & World Series

Blizzard Starcraft Series

Blizzard Diablo Series

Sims PC Series

Age of Empires Series

 Counter Strike Series

Half Life Series

Arma Series

Minecraft Series

Fortnite Series

 

 

Yeah, turns out you guys are right.  As of 2020 the PC market actually outranked the console market in terms of users, reversed in terms of revenue with both being obliterated by the mobile market.  

https://kevurugames.com/blog/mobile-gaming-vs-pc-gaming-overview-and-prospects/

So yeah I was wrong classifying PC gaming as niche 🙂 Just goes to show the difference between perception and facts LOL 

 

 

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by psolk

2 hours ago, blueshark747 said:

PC Gaming a niche market?

 

Some of you do realize with the PC platform there are 15+ year old titles still being purchased everyday?

FSX 2006

World of Warcraft 2005

Counter Strike 1999

Unreal Tournament 1999

No console platform even comes close to such versatility of recurring sales.

 

One of my first flight sim game was way back in 1988. You can still get a copy from Steam today.

Falcon A.T. on Steam (steampowered.com)