Steamspy has shared a really interesting graph about Steam. This graph shows Steam’s average sales by price points, and lists the number of games that are currently available on each price point. And as we can see, even though the $9.99 and $4.99 are the most popular price points, their average sales are not even close to those of games that are priced at $50 – $69.99.
Do note that this graph can be very misleading. The fact that the average sales are not close to 1 million does not mean that games have not reached that milestone. GTA V has 2.4 million sold copies, Dark Souls 2 nears 1 million sold copies, Tomb Raider has 3 million sold copies and Civilization V has 7 million sold copies.
In short, there are games selling like hotcakes on Steam (even without special free weekend offers). However, there are also games that have really, really low sales. And as a result of that, the average number of sales for each price point gets significantly decreased.
For example, there could be a game in the $8.00 – $9.99 price point that has over 10 million sales. However, if there are 100 games that have minimal sales (and we’re talking about 1443 games in total here, so that scenario is not unlikely), the average sales number drops to only 100,000. Ouch, right?
In conclusion, you should not let this graph mislead you. While the average sales of expensive games are indeed higher than the average sales of cheaper games, it does not mean that Steam’s best-selling title is priced at $59.99. Or that a number of cheaper games do not outsell other, triple-A and more expensive titles. Or that there can’t be successful titles in that lower tier categories.
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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