What would the size of the fanbase for a real SC4 sequel be?

[Durfsurn 539]

Just as the title says. Say if someone wanted to make a true SimCity 4 sequel what would the estimated selling amounts be?

[Andy Gainey 6]

Are you asking about a market size, i.e., number of people who would pay a typical amount of money to purchase such a sequel?  Or are you more curious about the number of more dedicated players who actively get involved in the community and/or talk about the game a lot with friends and acquaintances?

 

Last year I worked on a business plan focused on developing something that could loosely be considered a real SC4 sequel, so it was important for me to answer the first question about market size.  In the ideal case (that is, with a magical marketing ability to reach the entire target market), I would speculate anywhere from 1 to 3 million, largely based on what limited sales data I could find for the SimCity series in particular, and various other city builders like the Tropico or Anno series as well.  If one could break into a different, larger market (for example, crossing over into the realm of MineCraft players), then the target market could be 10 million, but that's a heck of a stretch.

 

As for fanbase, I found that to be a lot harder to estimate.  For a while I was considering a business model that would depend heavily on an active modding community, but the numbers I saw I would require were intimidating.  So I chose to not focus on the potential size of the fanbase, and just concern myself with playerbase instead.

[Ocram's Razr 964]

SimCity 4 in 3D: 1 million or less players

City Builder/Simulator with new features: 1-5 million players (based on SC2013 sales)

--Ocram