Swedish developer Frictional Games said it is taken aback by the strong sales of its horror title Amnesia: The Dark Descent, with the game's performance putting the team in a situation they "never imagined being in."
According to a blog post from studio co-founder Thomas Grip, Amnesia's sales have exceeded 200,000 units across online and Russian retail sales, doubling the company's original sales estimates of 100,000 units.
While Frictional Games saw healthy sales of 36,000 units just a month after the game's launch in September 2010, the months approaching the holiday season attracted an unexpected slew of new customers.
Grip notes the game has sold at least 200 units every day since launch, though many of those sales came in well below the suggested retail price thanks to a number of sales from online stores. The title was featured in Steam's recent holiday sale, which at times featured the game at more than 75 percent off.
Frictional Games didn't provide a large marketing blitz for the game, though Grip suggests user videos have greatly increased awareness for the title, with some videos attracting over 775,000 views.
Amnesia has also received attention through a number of industry awards, including three nominations at the upcoming Independent Games Festival.
"Based on what we have seen, the online PC market is just getting bigger and bigger, and we are convinced we are far from the end of this growth," said Grip, praising the viability of PC as a platform for indie developers.
With the new financial support from Amnesia's sales, Frictional Games says it hopes to take more risks and explore its creative options with its future titles.
I am so happy to see Frictional getting their due! These guys put out some of the best horror games to date. I played the Penumbra series, and Amnesia was a solid step up from the greatness of that series. Keep it up guys! I, for one, think the world absolutely needs more Lovecraft-inspired horror games, and Frictional knows how to deliver more than their fair share in this area, with innovative gameplay, solid mechanics, and fantastic visuals adding to some truly unsettling themes and stories the likes of which has only been successfully tread a handful of times. Obviously, I can't praise their work enough! =) Take a bow, Frictional, you earned it.
1. The game is well designed and fun to play. It doesn't try to do everything, but is very effective at what it does do.
2. The game is not $60, but closer to $20.
3. The game has limited DRM and could be purchased online.
4. The game was released on multiple platforms (PC, Mac, Linux)
Frankly, I liked the game and the philosophy behind how the game is being created/marketed that I purchased two copies; one from the publishers site and one from Steam. I hope the success of Amnesia is a message to not only independent game publishers but to the major studios.
In my opinion it is not that the PC market is growing but attractive prices on Steam and ease of use decreases piracy. PC market is definitely the biggest one but in the same time the most challengeing one. Look for example at Blizzard. They are making tons of money on the PC because they know how to do it. Install base of the PC computers is bigger than all consoles combined. The problem is piracy.
I think that digital distribution offering low prices can finally fight with that. When the games are sold for prices around $5 more and more people stop pirating and start buying. Why would you download pirated and potentially virus infected stuff when you can get it for a few buck legally in a very easy and convenient way including all online features like leaderboards, achievements etc.. Finally game distributors start to provide a better service than pirates. In the same time higher sales volume allow developers to decrease prices and still be profitable.
Amnesia is an AWFULLY SCARY game!
1. The game is well designed and fun to play. It doesn't try to do everything, but is very effective at what it does do.
2. The game is not $60, but closer to $20.
3. The game has limited DRM and could be purchased online.
4. The game was released on multiple platforms (PC, Mac, Linux)
Frankly, I liked the game and the philosophy behind how the game is being created/marketed that I purchased two copies; one from the publishers site and one from Steam. I hope the success of Amnesia is a message to not only independent game publishers but to the major studios.
I think that digital distribution offering low prices can finally fight with that. When the games are sold for prices around $5 more and more people stop pirating and start buying. Why would you download pirated and potentially virus infected stuff when you can get it for a few buck legally in a very easy and convenient way including all online features like leaderboards, achievements etc.. Finally game distributors start to provide a better service than pirates. In the same time higher sales volume allow developers to decrease prices and still be profitable.