Daily Briefing: Wednesday 16th March

Elden Ring Sells Over 12 Million Copies & The IP Will Continue

“Please look forward to more of "ELDEN RING" as an IP (characters and other intellectual property) in hopes of expanding beyond the realm of games.”, reads a press release from FromSoftware and Bandai Namco. 12 million units in under 3 weeks is an extraordinary speed to sell units, especially for a new IP. The Souls series was reported to have sold sold a total of 27 million lifetime sales in 2020, with over 10 million of those being Dark Souls 3 since March 2016. Elden Ring is a force to be reckoned with, with industry analysts saying this is a new IP on a genuinely unprecedented sale. The biggest new IP since The Division, etc.

• Mat Piscatella of the NPD Group has said it dwarfs other extreme game events, like Activision’s explosive sales of CoD2 or Guitar Hero, or WB’s Arkham. “True outlier performance”. For comparison, Ghost of Tsushima broke 10 million recently, and Horizon Zero Dawn’s lifetime sales, after 5 years, was reported as over 20 million.

Another Excellent Game! Tunic Is Out On Game Pass & Reviewing Strong

Tunic, the indie action-adventure by one indie developer, dropped on PC and Xbox Game Pass today. It’s reviewing in the high-80s at time of writing, being lauded as an excellent isometric Legend of Zelda featuring an anthropomorphic fox. It’s modern and playable, but also challenging and inspired by the 16-bit era - with reviewers praising the game’s sense of ‘discovery’ and ‘wonder’.

• Another game that feels modern but captures the experience of the earliest days of videogames? We’re honestly being spoiled this year, so far.

Private Division Announce Four New Dev Partnerships

Die Gute Fabrik, Evening Star, Piccolo Studio, and Yellow Brick Games will be releasing their games as Private Division games, Take-Two’s label. Most notably of these, Yellow Brick Game is a Canadian developer comprised of Bioware and Ubisoft developers, including Dragon Age’s Mike Laidlaw. Evening Star were the names behind Sonic Mania, which means Private Division are definitely going wide with their net. Lots of games to look forward to, although Take-Two have warned they don’t expect the first of these games until FY2024.

• Exciting news to know the groundwork is laid now for games in the future - Private Division have taken a hit with Disintegration being a major disappointment, but between The Outer Worlds, OlliOlli World and Ancestors selling 1 million despite mixed reviews, their ‘publish whatever seems cool’ approach is working!