Sales for Sim City 5

[Biscuits33 0]

I have tried looking for sales figures on the internet but could not find any. Admittedly I didn't look that hard but I am very curious as to how the game is selling given all of the negativity surrounding the launch. It might be a bit early to get these figures but if anyone has any idea or could point me in the right direction I would appreciate it.

 

Also - I'd love to see what the return numbers are as well. Wouldn't be shocked if as much as 5% of units sold were returned.

[cirugo 1,889]

If they were great we would have heard by now.

I just hope they were bad enough to finally wake them up to the disaster they spent a year fighting with everyone about instead of actually listening to feedback and doing something about it.

[uebs 11]

Initial sales probably was 5x more than the expected, because they had 4 servers and now they have 20 servers...

 

Then it probably took a dive hard and fast, with all the negative mainstream press coverage and the bad game site reviews.

 

I'm at 90+ hours now...

[Xenocity 343]

The UK charts show it at number 2.

NPD numbers for U.S. for March won't be out until early April (they only count physical copies)

Mainand EU doesn't release numbers .

So all in all you'll have to wait until EA's next quarterly report (it's illegal to lie to investors)

[Camlon 50]

Initial sales probably was 5x more than the expected, because they had 4 servers and now they have 20 servers...

Haha, no. They knew exactly how many preordered the game. What they miscalculated was the stress on the servers. 

[duxie 0]

 Take the number of in-store sales (prediction only) and preorders via origin and other vendors (will have been known to EA/Maxis well beforehand) and you get a decent amount. As Camlon said: it was the load on the servers, which should have been more thoroughly tested in the beta, that caused the issues. It was more of an incompetence by the system admins when they predicted the load on the servers, not the actual numbers of games sold.

[mastorofpuppetz 199]

Initial sales probably was 5x more than the expected, because they had 4 servers and now they have 20 servers...

Haha, no. They knew exactly how many preordered the game. What they miscalculated was the stress on the servers. 

HUH? Preorders are often just a fraction of week 1 sales so no they didnt know.

[Catchin22 299]

As the saying goes any publicity is good publicity. If they fix all their issues I would expect with as much attention as it's gotten sales will be extremely good.

[uebs 11]

As the saying goes any publicity is good publicity. If they fix all their issues I would expect with as much attention as it's gotten sales will be extremely good.

 

Publicity is good...

 

but bad reviews and bad word of mouth trumps that...

 

Before I played the game I recommended it to my cousin, sister and her friend...(they don't do pre-order's)

 

Now when they ask I say it's meh at best...

 

Anyone looking to purchase here on out will go with reviews and word of mouth...

[Zpike 79]

As the saying goes any publicity is good publicity. If they fix all their issues I would expect with as much attention as it's gotten sales will be extremely good.

 

Publicity is good...

 

but bad reviews and bad word of mouth trumps that...

 

Before I played the game I recommended it to my cousin, sister and her friend...(they don't do pre-order's)

 

Now when they ask I say it's meh at best...

 

Anyone looking to purchase here on out will go with reviews and word of mouth...

 

And I have been telling my friends about how great the game is.  I now have 4 friends playing the game all in the same region and we love it.

 

The good work of mouth is spreading too.  Just because there are some who don't like the game does not mean the game is bad or "meh".  Server traffic says it all and the servers are full every night while they keep having to add more to handle the load.

 

I'd say the game is going strong and will continue that way if my and my friends game experience is any indication.

[pyanodon 218]

^^^^^^^ i wanna see the results after some months.

[Board_Marshal 104]

 

As the saying goes any publicity is good publicity. If they fix all their issues I would expect with as much attention as it's gotten sales will be extremely good.

 

Publicity is good...

 

but bad reviews and bad word of mouth trumps that...

 

Before I played the game I recommended it to my cousin, sister and her friend...(they don't do pre-order's)

 

Now when they ask I say it's meh at best...

 

Anyone looking to purchase here on out will go with reviews and word of mouth...

 

And I have been telling my friends about how great the game is.  I now have 4 friends playing the game all in the same region and we love it.

 

The good work of mouth is spreading too.  Just because there are some who don't like the game does not mean the game is bad or "meh". Server traffic says it all and the servers are full every night while they keep having to add more to handle the load.

 

I'd say the game is going strong and will continue that way if my and my friends game experience is any indication.

 

Of course the serves are full, everybody paid money for the game and as long as you can lay down stuff in a city people are going to try and recoup their cost through hours of play no matter how frustrating it may or may not be.  Its also new.  Even if its "broken, etc" its my belief that people, but especially people who want to play SimCity, want to figure it out like a puzzle, even if the answers don't make sense, the joy was in the means, not the ends.. 

 

Yes, it is possible a non-insignificant amount have barely scratched the surface and are simply acting with mob mentality but these exist for every game which makes their presence irrelevant, we all ignore them.  There are plenty of posts by people who've taken the time to "figure out the puzzle" and its their opinions which carry the most weight and yes some of it highlights problems, some of which may be somewhat trivial but others seem to be significant.

  Edited March 15, 2013 by CaptCity  
Let's stick to the topic.

[Catchin22 299]

The game is GREAT I believe that as fact. Right now, however, you will likely lose your city at some point due to a rollback. When will you get it back? Weeks? Months? Never? I've had my 2 largest most time spent cities become lost seemingly forever and EA / Maxis isn't even addressing the issue beyond asking who has been effected. No news on if they are going to get them back or what they are doing about it.

[Zpike 79]

The game is GREAT I believe that as fact. Right now, however, you will likely lose your city at some point due to a rollback. When will you get it back? Weeks? Months? Never? I've had my 2 largest most time spent cities become lost seemingly forever and EA / Maxis isn't even addressing the issue beyond asking who has been effected. No news on if they are going to get them back or what they are doing about it.

 

 

http://answers.ea.com/t5/Miscellaneous-Issues/Info-request-Cannot-process-this-city-at-this-time/m-p/731774#U731774

 

They are looking into it and they are talking to people.  I also have a city I can't get into.  My guess is they fixed server stability first, then are going after other bugs.

[macvirt 361]

The UK charts show it at number 2.

NPD numbers for U.S. for March won't be out until early April (they only count physical copies)

Mainand EU doesn't release numbers .

So all in all you'll have to wait until EA's next quarterly report (it's illegal to lie to investors)

 

It's not illegal to lie to investors, at least not back home stateside. Welcome to the art of statistics There's an entire sector of industry that specialises in these things  

 

Back serious though, the best material is not the quarterly reports, but the annual venture briefing. That is where everything comes together, quarterly reporting is far too easy to use creatively. 

[Catchin22 299]

The game is GREAT I believe that as fact. Right now, however, you will likely lose your city at some point due to a rollback. When will you get it back? Weeks? Months? Never? I've had my 2 largest most time spent cities become lost seemingly forever and EA / Maxis isn't even addressing the issue beyond asking who has been effected. No news on if they are going to get them back or what they are doing about it.

 

 

 

http://answers.ea.com/t5/Miscellaneous-Issues/Info-request-Cannot-process-this-city-at-this-time/m-p/731774#U731774

 

They are looking into it and they are talking to people.  I also have a city I can't get into.  My guess is they fixed server stability first, then are going after other bugs.

I'm well aware they are looking into it but have yet done anything about it. Anyone who lost a city, which is a LOT of people, should have had them all recovered by now. Those threads are CONSTANTLY being posted in, and those are just the people who know how to find a place to complain!

The game should have a built in ticket / support system since it's now a service.

[CaptCity 4,915]

Let's remember that those who have positive things to say about the game have the same opportunity to speak - just as those who don't have been. There's really no need to argue about someone's experiences while playing the game. Comments need to directed at the topic, not each other.

[Biscuits33 0]

Thanks to Xeno and others for the responses. (Notwithstanding the slight derail in the middle there)

 

Ultimately I think the publicity (even the bad stuff, believe it or not) has helped the game to some extent. It brings non-sim city franchise players to the table and even if the food smells a little funky they still kind of want a taste in some cases. With a clean launch and no press (bad or good) these non-franchise people never even get to the table.

 

Anyway, enough with the dinner-time analogies. I'll keep looking around for figures, especially after the close of the first-quarter earnings period and post them here. As for me personally, I'm biding my time and want to see how this all shakes out. The most recent development of being able to play offline entirely is pretty earth-shattering and EA/Maxis needs to address this ASAP.

 

Oh, and a good point by CaptCity above. There are more than enough threads about the game being good or not - I'm looking for more objective information. Stats, as it were.

[baertooth 330]

I've been looking for sales figures too and EA isn't saying.

 

However, in one interview one of the devs said the outage was affecting more than a hundred thousand users (which implies between 100,000-199,999) but another said hundreds of thousands of users plus the tens of thousands of users being added a day.

 

I don't have SC2013 but I would be interested in who does would log in and tally how many servers there are and how many players on each server.  Maybe we can get an idea of how many players that are active at a given time.

[jigsaw 227]

IMO, i think they made their money, now they have to just repair the PR damage. (made the money, lost face)

 

just googling around the net you can see the size of this game.. it was HUGE last week on the day of release in countries all over the world...

 

then the great crash occurred.......

 

and judging by the sheer size of the anger/media/backlash, this game has affected a ridiculously large amount of people.... the gross size of the simcity fanbase is millions.

 

and the i think EA/Maxis only now just realised how important and personal this game is to a lot of people.

[macvirt 361]

That lesson is only relevant in terms of determining the ratio of those who care versus those who buy blindly. Don't expect any emotion to be attached to that, this is an industry.

 

Besides, the more of those people who care to not participate any more in the market streams the easier it gets to sell more to the volume markets. At lower development costs, at higher MT gains, and so forth. 

 

I realise this is a bit cold, but it pays to upset people who care in niche franchises that are subjected to the reboot doctrines of today.

[Xenocity 343]

EA has revealed that Simcity has sold 1.1 million during the launch week.

This includes all the returned/refunded  copies.

 

Currently sales are just passing 1.3 million and counting.

 

What does this mean?

 

1. It is half way to outselling all the verisons of Simcity 1 combined
2. It is almost half way to outselling all the verisons of Simcity 2000
3. It is almost 1/5th of the way to outselling Simcity 3000
4. It is over half way to outselling Simcity 4

By Easter Sunday Simcity 2013 will be the second best selling Simcity to date (behind Simcity 3000)

 

Never underestimate the power of online gaming...

[The_City_Builder 299]

I love the game, but stop and think. How many of them actually were happy with their purchase?

[Xenocity 343]

I love the game, but stop and think. How many of them actually were happy with their purchase?

They were given the opportunity to return the game for a refund.

[el.lopan 54]

Not surprising, many people were so blindly hyped they were like "omgg new and shinyyy, take my money" and they would even pay 100USD for more shiny dlcs.

[mastorofpuppetz 199]

Sales do not equal quality.................Often more sales = aiming at the lowest common denominator. IS Mcdonalds the best burger joint? IS Justin beiber better then led zepplin? People bought it for the name only, how many will be playing this in 3-4 months? Not many unless they make drastic changes.

[Metalpuritan 161]

1.1 million suckers.  Nah, I am just kidding.  I know you all are completely happy with your purchases and have absolutely no ill will towards EA Games.  I am happy for you if you are happy yourselves with SC2013.

 

I actually WANT SC2013 to be successful, though I do not like it at all, not even a little.  The way I see it, the more success it has the better the chances are we will eventually get a REAL new Sim City.  Until that day comes however I will be staying with sim city4(I am just glad I didn't get suckered into buying this new game).  I hate Sims3 and everything it stands for, this new game tries it's hardest to act like a hybrid of that and the REAL SimCity.  Also, I will not be suckered into buying DLC, this game could very well end up costing a great many of well over 100 or even 200 dollars.  Sims3 is running upwards of 300 dollars in fact right now to get all expansions(DLC).  I won't be sold piecemeal.  Give it to me at a high price for all game content, even if that means paying 300 dollars for a complete game outright, or give me the DLC free, there is no in between with me.  I just want to be able to make a good decision on a game before I buy it and if they continue to divide games up like they are they make it impossible for me to guage, and thus no purchase.

[Ion_Cannon 677]

EA has revealed that Simcity has sold 1.1 million during the launch week.

This includes all the returned/refunded  copies.

 

Currently sales are just passing 1.3 million and counting.

 

What does this mean?

 

1. It is half way to outselling all the verisons of Simcity 1 combined
2. It is almost half way to outselling all the verisons of Simcity 2000
3. It is almost 1/5th of the way to outselling Simcity 3000
4. It is over half way to outselling Simcity 4

By Easter Sunday Simcity 2013 will be the second best selling Simcity to date (behind Simcity 3000)

 

Never underestimate the power of online gaming...

 

Where exactly do you get the numbers from that it's halfway to outselling simcity 4? If you're going to cite facts you need to provide a source. It's also hardly suprising that its sold more than the earlier simcity games, the market size is much much larger now. I can't help but think a game more like Simcity 4 but with better graphics and a few more options would have sold a lot more than Simcity 2013 has.

[Urban Cartographer 601]

What is popular is not always good: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ItsPopularNowItSucks

 

As many have stated, sales do not equal quality.  Look at a certain action game series made by Activision for example.  It keeps breaking the "fastest selling entertainment medium" record every single November for the past few years, yet the games are very much the same, but with slightly updated graphics.  Sheep indeed.

 

I for one do not buy into hype, as I keep a critical mind and often have the "I told you so" feeling.  I am very glad that I did not buy SimCity 2013, as much as I am a SimCity fan.

[Charizard 284]

I think everyone knew the launch week sales were going to be high because of the hype and massive ad campaign. Plus the market is larger now. However three things to keep in mind.

 

1. As people have stated I doubt everyone who purchased the game was satisfied with their game after all the issues.

2. Quantity does not equal quality, as we can see with CoD.

3. The overall sales of the game near the end of its life will never be as high as they could have been because of all the negative PR and issues with the game. Remember, people didn't discover the problems with the game until AFTER the game launched.