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Starfield has been played by more than 11 million people to date. Launch day set a new record for most Game Pass subs added in a day

ReBurn

Gold Member
Just 11 million? Less than 60% of Game Pass subscribers?

Honestly, I’m surprised!

Also, I had underestimated how big Forza Horizon 5 was, considering it has comfortably eclipsed Starfield.
episode 14 todd flanders GIF

One of these days you will make Starfield a failure. I believe in you.
 
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PaintTinJr

Member
I call bullshit on your statement. Starfield was rumoured at $200 Million to make. Here's Netflix's top 10 -

Ozark (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
The Defenders (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
Sense8 (2015) - $9 Million Per Episode
Marco Polo (2014) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Witcher (2019) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Get Down (2016) - $11 Million Per Episode
The Crown (2016) - $13 Million Per Episode
The Sandman (2022) - $15 Million Per Episode
One Piece (2023) - $18 Million Per Episode
Stranger Things (2016) - $30 Million Per Episode

Seems pretty comparable to me, maybe next time you make some wild statements you could provide a little background as to how you arrive at your bullshit.
Despite the numbers you've listed clearly making your point factually, in the context of the overall point you were seemingly making, the price of those TV shows are less, relative to the longevity they have to earn from from full price customers and with much wider audience appeal, because unlike TV, games aren't passive and the ability for gamers on gamepass to stumble on Starfield 9 years from now, like say a Netflix customer stumbling on the excellent 2014 Marco Polo, and then commit 200hrs to an old buggy game and keep their sub because of it, is far less than the simple passive time commitment of a viewer to watch the +50hrs of the Marco Polo seasons and stay subbed for it, and without being put off by it's 9year old production quality, which unlike Starfield will be almost identical to a show of today.

Starfield, or any game on a sub for that matter, has a briefer time to appear as premium content because of the way games age with their hardware. Starfield not quite being at the premium polish delivery of the best in the AAA business, as I write this, doesn't bode well for how it will age to bring in or retain subs, and shortens its appeal as premium content which negatively works against the cost of the content. It could be argued it currently is already exiting the premium content category in gaming circles like gaf because anyone that said it was premium has likely tried it already, and those that couldn't are now seeing the broader and deeper review trend that is taking away that premium shine, an issue that a cancelled show like Marco Polo doesn't have for reasons already stated.
 
I call bullshit on your statement. Starfield was rumoured at $200 Million to make. Here's Netflix's top 10 -

Ozark (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
The Defenders (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
Sense8 (2015) - $9 Million Per Episode
Marco Polo (2014) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Witcher (2019) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Get Down (2016) - $11 Million Per Episode
The Crown (2016) - $13 Million Per Episode
The Sandman (2022) - $15 Million Per Episode
One Piece (2023) - $18 Million Per Episode
Stranger Things (2016) - $30 Million Per Episode

Seems pretty comparable to me, maybe next time you make some wild statements you could provide a little background as to how you arrive at your bullshit.
My statement is correct, I said the average show not the most expensive show
 

poppabk

Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
I call bullshit on your statement. Starfield was rumoured at $200 Million to make. Here's Netflix's top 10 -

Ozark (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
The Defenders (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
Sense8 (2015) - $9 Million Per Episode
Marco Polo (2014) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Witcher (2019) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Get Down (2016) - $11 Million Per Episode
The Crown (2016) - $13 Million Per Episode
The Sandman (2022) - $15 Million Per Episode
One Piece (2023) - $18 Million Per Episode
Stranger Things (2016) - $30 Million Per Episode

Seems pretty comparable to me, maybe next time you make some wild statements you could provide a little background as to how you arrive at your bullshit.
And netflix subscriptions dropped during the period that Stranger Things season 3 released.
 
Despite the numbers you've listed clearly making your point factually, in the context of the overall point you were seemingly making, the price of those TV shows are less, relative to the longevity they have to earn from from full price customers and with much wider audience appeal, because unlike TV, games aren't passive and the ability for gamers on gamepass to stumble on Starfield 9 years from now, like say a Netflix customer stumbling on the excellent 2014 Marco Polo, and then commit 200hrs to an old buggy game and keep their sub because of it, is far less than the simple passive time commitment of a viewer to watch the +50hrs of the Marco Polo seasons and stay subbed for it, and without being put off by it's 9year old production quality, which unlike Starfield will be almost identical to a show of today.

Starfield, or any game on a sub for that matter, has a briefer time to appear as premium content because of the way games age with their hardware. Starfield not quite being at the premium polish delivery of the best in the AAA business, as I write this, doesn't bode well for how it will age to bring in or retain subs, and shortens its appeal as premium content which negatively works against the cost of the content. It could be argued it currently is already exiting the premium content category in gaming circles like gaf because anyone that said it was premium has likely tried it already, and those that couldn't are now seeing the broader and deeper review trend that is taking away that premium shine, an issue that a cancelled show like Marco Polo doesn't have for reasons already stated.

False logic. Starfield takes longer to make than a TV show and a studio like Bethesda has other projects/revenue streams. Also TV shows aging and royalties from shows are a thing, you know the $100Million a year Netflix pay for Friends to be there.

My statement is correct, I said the average show not the most expensive show

Oh so you want to compare apples to oranges to make your strawman argument. Gotchya. I picked the top ten specifically to head off this argument e.g. Starfield is a top 10ish production, just as Netflix shows listed. You know, apples to apples and all.
 
Despite the numbers you've listed clearly making your point factually, in the context of the overall point you were seemingly making, the price of those TV shows are less, relative to the longevity they have to earn from from full price customers and with much wider audience appeal, because unlike TV, games aren't passive and the ability for gamers on gamepass to stumble on Starfield 9 years from now, like say a Netflix customer stumbling on the excellent 2014 Marco Polo, and then commit 200hrs to an old buggy game and keep their sub because of it, is far less than the simple passive time commitment of a viewer to watch the +50hrs of the Marco Polo seasons and stay subbed for it, and without being put off by it's 9year old production quality, which unlike Starfield will be almost identical to a show of today.

Starfield, or any game on a sub for that matter, has a briefer time to appear as premium content because of the way games age with their hardware. Starfield not quite being at the premium polish delivery of the best in the AAA business, as I write this, doesn't bode well for how it will age to bring in or retain subs, and shortens its appeal as premium content which negatively works against the cost of the content. It could be argued it currently is already exiting the premium content category in gaming circles like gaf because anyone that said it was premium has likely tried it already, and those that couldn't are now seeing the broader and deeper review trend that is taking away that premium shine, an issue that a cancelled show like Marco Polo doesn't have for reasons already stated.
Also Netflix has as I mentioned 400+ million subscribers, when your subscriber base is that large, you can afford to make both expensive and cheap shows and even cancel the ones which are a total failure with little financial impact, see Resident Evil for an example of this.

The reality is that Gamepass had about 25 million subscribers before the forced merger with Xbox Live Gold and the only reason that MS is able to actually maintain Gamepass as a service is because it's propped up by infinity money from Windows, Office, and Azure. It's not financially sustainable if it wasn't funded by Daddy MS, whereas Netflix is not only very profitable but continues to increase subscriber base and revenues year in and year out.
 

poppabk

Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
....and the only reason that MS is able to actually maintain Gamepass as a service is because it's propped up by infinity money from Windows, Office, and Azure. It's not financially sustainable if it wasn't funded by Daddy MS.....
We don't actually know this. The closest we got to actual revenue/profit was positive but so vague as to be ... well too vague.
 

PaintTinJr

Member
False logic. Starfield takes longer to make than a TV show and a studio like Bethesda has other projects/revenue streams. Also TV shows aging and royalties from shows are a thing, you know the $100Million a year Netflix pay for Friends to be there.

....
I don't follow the point you are making, now.

I thought your position was to show how Netflix shows are the same type of cost and risk reward as starfield, which it clearly isn't. Also Microsoft's time to develop starfield for gamepass was just two years because prior to that Zenimax was independent and they didn't develop the game for the intention of gamepass at the beginning.
 
We don't actually know this. The closest we got to actual revenue/profit was positive but so vague as to be ... well too vague.
MS has long obfuscated what is going on with smaller company projects like Surface and Xbox and that is by design. Shareholders don't like seeing money wasted, even if the wasted amount is insignificant compared to overall company revenue and profit. MS prints money as a matter of course from Windows, Office, and Azure so to be completely fair the smaller stuff like Surface and Xbox are basically accounting errors by comparison. As a holder of MSFT myself, I don't really concern myself with how much MS spends to prop up useless projects like Gamepass as long as the overall top and bottom lines keep setting records every quarter and every year, which they do.
 
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LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
Talk about some hyperbole. Squadron 42 looks good in it's newest trailer, but it's not out yet. Star Citizen is definitely not a complete game, and isn't close to it yet.
Maybe we can come halfway but we know where Starfield is and it's a disappointment.
 

Gavon West

Spread's Cheeks for Intrusive Ads
How many stayed on after that month? How many were trials? Saying it was the biggest day for subs means nothing without more information. The way MS has spun metrics to suit them is actually impressive because fanboys eat it up.
Because you'd be so pleased about the numbers that once you had the actual data of GP subs, that metric alone would completely satisfy your curiosity, right?


Like.....right? Like......
 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
How many stayed on after that month? How many were trials? Saying it was the biggest day for subs means nothing without more information. The way MS has spun metrics to suit them is actually impressive because fanboys eat it up.

There were no game pass trials around the time the game came out, there was even a GAF topic about it.

So, not a single one of those new sign-ups because of Starfield was a trial.

Take comfort in that.
 

Jayjayhd34

Member
Funny thing about my gamepass I had 12cmonths free from bt the 12 was up so canceled and is at ill going basically getting gamepass for free
 

StereoVsn

Member
Maybe a bargain bin game in 5 years. Major letdown for me. Lets hope Elder Scrolls doesn't suffer as much.

This is 1/100th the game Star Citizen/Squadron 42 is.
Now, let’s not get crazy. Only one of these two is an actual game and not a tech demo. Mind you it’s not a very good game but that’s better then whatever Chris Roberts is peddling.
 

DaGwaphics

Member
I call bullshit on your statement. Starfield was rumoured at $200 Million to make. Here's Netflix's top 10 -

Ozark (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
The Defenders (2017) - $8 Million Per Episode
Sense8 (2015) - $9 Million Per Episode
Marco Polo (2014) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Witcher (2019) - $10 Million Per Episode
The Get Down (2016) - $11 Million Per Episode
The Crown (2016) - $13 Million Per Episode
The Sandman (2022) - $15 Million Per Episode
One Piece (2023) - $18 Million Per Episode
Stranger Things (2016) - $30 Million Per Episode

Seems pretty comparable to me, maybe next time you make some wild statements you could provide a little background as to how you arrive at your bullshit.


This!

Plus, this comparison requires the proper context, namely the amount of content the service needs to provide to users per month/year, etc. TV/Film is such a passive experience that you need a ton of content because people are doing other things while watching it and can run through content very quickly. MS is only targeting a game per quarter so far.

I don't know who could say that players won't stumble upon older games on a subscription service either. Old games often go on sale on Steam and some make it quite a ways up the chart.
 
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Three

Member
Fixed it for you.
Even that wouldn't be true. EAFC 24 was the number 1 best selling game in Europe, not Starfield.

"More played it on xbox" might also not be true. More "hours spent" were on xbox at near 50%. 'More players' might still be on PC but likely dropped the game quicker. 2/3rds of sales were on PC after all.
 
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Atrus

Gold Member
I would say that the distractionary hype is detrimental to the IP. Instead of working to fix their game, they are concerned in portraying it as some great success. We’re still waiting on the first sizeable patch.

By and large this will likely be the worst selling Bethesda RPG in a long while and instead of wasting resources on Redfall, they need to invest capital, like CDProjekt did with cyberpunk, so there’s a future for the IP.

Currently, Starfield is associated with lazy, ancient design by a studio that didn’t give a shit. It’s not a good look.
 
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Seems like it was atleast somewhat successful to generate that much engagement ( not trying to be a prick here). So why not just comeout and say what it sold in the traditional sense? Unless they feel like that number was a disappointment or would atleast be precived as one and before anyone gets up in arms and starts yelling about but gamepass subs (i agree its important to MS) blah blah blah, sales matter to the company as well so they could have atleast spilled the beans on that metric in addition, unless they believe it would tarnish the perception (i firmly believe this).
 

UltimaKilo

Gold Member
You think netflix gives a shit how many DVDs Stranger Things sold? All they care about is recurring payments.
That’s it. It’s all about net profit, and how they get there is mostly irrelevant.

Anyway, Starfield was a fine game, glad Bethesda is being rewarded for taking a chance on a new IP. Tired of Ass Creed 72, GOW 27 and Call of Duty 936
 

MarkMe2525

Member
Despite the numbers you've listed clearly making your point factually, in the context of the overall point you were seemingly making, the price of those TV shows are less, relative to the longevity they have to earn from from full price customers and with much wider audience appeal, because unlike TV, games aren't passive and the ability for gamers on gamepass to stumble on Starfield 9 years from now, like say a Netflix customer stumbling on the excellent 2014 Marco Polo, and then commit 200hrs to an old buggy game and keep their sub because of it, is far less than the simple passive time commitment of a viewer to watch the +50hrs of the Marco Polo seasons and stay subbed for it, and without being put off by it's 9year old production quality, which unlike Starfield will be almost identical to a show of today.

Starfield, or any game on a sub for that matter, has a briefer time to appear as premium content because of the way games age with their hardware. Starfield not quite being at the premium polish delivery of the best in the AAA business, as I write this, doesn't bode well for how it will age to bring in or retain subs, and shortens its appeal as premium content which negatively works against the cost of the content. It could be argued it currently is already exiting the premium content category in gaming circles like gaf because anyone that said it was premium has likely tried it already, and those that couldn't are now seeing the broader and deeper review trend that is taking away that premium shine, an issue that a cancelled show like Marco Polo doesn't have for reasons already stated.
Starfield isn't a particular buggy game today, why is it going to be so in 9 years? Also, your first paragraphs premise is based on someone staying subscribed for one game, and that just is not realistic. I agree that no one is going to discover Starfield 9 year from now and stay subscribed just to continue playing the game, but that also isn't gamepasses value proposition.

Idk, I went back and read a little of the convo beforehand, but I might be missing some context.
 

DaGwaphics

Member
Is this similar to "game X downloaded Y times"?
What garantee that a person downloaded the game, played for like 10 minutes and then dropped?

MS publishes a list of the most played games on Xbox. The top 10 is insanely hard for new games to crack for any length of time, I think Hogwarts was only up there for a week. This game was top 3 for about a month and is still hanging in there.

I think it's safe to assume that the hours per player stat is above average.
 
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Fredrik

Member
Is this similar to "game X downloaded Y times"?
What garantee that a person downloaded the game, played for like 10 minutes and then dropped?
There are never guarantees. And one of these days you’ll realize that games you see on sales top lists can be put on a shelf and never be played or dropped in 10 minutes and aren’t even counted equally on all platforms with Nintendo platforms sometimes completely excluding digital sales when other platforms celebrate their ”win”.

Fabricated PR numbers or not. It’s a success anyway you look at it. It’s not like every game get 11 million people to download it and play it for 10 minutes. Even reaching a million can trigger a PR notice. And this is a new IP too, and no online modes, and a dev with a somewhat bad reputation. It’s worth some celebration 🍾
 
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1 million in over a month is a serious rate decrease.

We'll see if there is any nominal uptick through the holidays, but my guess is that the Xbox series is a dead platform after January 1.

There seems to be continued obfuscation around how well Starfield performed, but I think MOST of us measure the goals around Starfield (enough to foreclose it on PS5) to be as follows:

  • Sell Xbox Series Consoles
  • Sell GamePass Subscriptions
    • Retain MAU beyond 3 months
We've seen in every reported region in the world that Starfield failed to move Xbox Series passed the PS5 with no major release for even the month of September. That is enough to suggest that it didn't sell a sufficient number of units because I don't really think anyone would say the PS5 sold an exceptional number of units in September and by all reports it comfortable outsold the Xbox Series.

With Spider-Man 2, the PS5 Slim, and new accessories, the PS5 is going to have an extremely strong holiday season while the Xbox has nothing to push it this holiday. I'm stunned that Microsoft hasn't dropped the price yet, because that's the only thing left in their control to do. They should immediately drop the price by 100 dollars for the XSX and 50 dollars for the XSS. That they haven't dropped the price tells me that don't want to to eat the operating cost for selling at a loss even if it means maintaining market share. That tells me they are no longer interested in market share this generation, and that's a VERY dangerous conclusion to make this early in the cycle that will reverberate into the next cycle.

Not sure we've seen any reason to believe that GamePass subscribership would have largely advanced due to this game. Forza 5 seemingly got significantly more players though perhaps less engagement. Even if 75% of players played it on GamePass, that would still only be 8.25 million. Let's be aggressive and say half of these are new subscribers, that would mean Starfield only drove 4.125 million subscribers... that's not sufficient, particularly because there is no guarantee that they'll stay beyond 3 months, especially with nothing of note on the horizon.

The player counts for Starfield on in serious decline on Steam. Even Xbox players have moved on to other games falling behind games like Stray...

Perplexed by people who are saying this game wasn't a failure, when it clearly is.
 
There are never guarantees. And one of these days you’ll realize that games you see on sales top lists can be put on a shelf and never be played or dropped in 10 minutes and aren’t even counted equally on all platforms with Nintendo platforms sometimes completely excluding digital sales when other platforms celebrate their ”win”.

Fabricated PR numbers or not. It’s a success anyway you look at it. It’s not like every game get 11 million people to download it and play it for 10 minutes. Even reaching a million can trigger a PR notice. And this is a new IP too, and no online modes, and a dev with a somewhat bad reputation. It’s worth some celebration 🍾

The number of players doesn't make it a success.

Game X has 11 million downloads and Game Z has 11 million downloads?

Both games are a success by your definition, regardless of the cost and time to produce, the cost of buying the company that produced it, the opportunity costs, and the marketing costs.

For example, for the money it took Sony to buy Insomniac (229 million dollars) and the time it took them to create Miles Morales, Rift Apart, and Spider-Man 2, and the cost it took to create those 3 games compared to the money it took Microsoft to buy Zenimax (7.5 billion dollars) and the revenue generated by all their games in the same time period... I can assure you that Starfield isn't a success in that story.

Starfield was in development for 8 years with a studio larger than Insomniacs. That game was extremely expensive to develop and almost certainly costs more than 200 million dollars.

If you told Phil Spencer this was going to be the results of Starfield when he bought Zenimax, either he would have released it on PS5 to make up the development cost or he wouldn't have bought Zenimax at all.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
Just 11 million? Less than 60% of Game Pass subscribers?

Honestly, I’m surprised!

Also, I had underestimated how big Forza Horizon 5 was, considering it has comfortably eclipsed Starfield.

I'd put money that you probably made similar comments about forza horizon 5 when that launched.....

"Only xx million players...I would have expected more that's only xx percent of the users" something along those lines....

As transparent as glass
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
The number of players doesn't make it a success.

Game X has 11 million downloads and Game Z has 11 million downloads?

Both games are a success by your definition, regardless of the cost and time to produce, the cost of buying the company that produced it, the opportunity costs, and the marketing costs.

For example, for the money it took Sony to buy Insomniac (229 million dollars) and the time it took them to create Miles Morales, Rift Apart, and Spider-Man 2, and the cost it took to create those 3 games compared to the money it took Microsoft to buy Zenimax (7.5 billion dollars) and the revenue generated by all their games in the same time period... I can assure you that Starfield isn't a success in that story.

Starfield was in development for 8 years with a studio larger than Insomniacs. That game was extremely expensive to develop and almost certainly costs more than 200 million dollars.

If you told Phil Spencer this was going to be the results of Starfield when he bought Zenimax, either he would have released it on PS5 to make up the development cost or he wouldn't have bought Zenimax at all.

This is a great post to wake up to.

Comparing insomniac, a company that owns one ip...sunset overdrive ....and has only made games for other license holders...to Zenimax who embodies multiple A class studios and a handful of the most well known IP in gaming history.

You're comparing 3 years to what Microsoft will be looking at as decades of business opportunities. Do you think insomniac pulls any money in for the next spider man movie?

...what about the fallout TV show next year For Microsoft?

Try not to be so small minded in your analysis.
 
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Sw0pDiller

Member
You boys can spin the numbers as much as you like but Starfield has been a commercial succes, however not as big as ms or their loyal followers would have liked it to be. 10 milion players, what does that mean. Record new gp subs, we want Numbers! And do they count the 1 dollar for two weeks promo’s? You can bet your ass they do. Starfield did not sell more consoles so its safe to assume most xbox players where allready in their ecosystem.
 

Fredrik

Member
The number of players doesn't make it a success.

Game X has 11 million downloads and Game Z has 11 million downloads?

Both games are a success by your definition, regardless of the cost and time to produce, the cost of buying the company that produced it, the opportunity costs, and the marketing costs.

For example, for the money it took Sony to buy Insomniac (229 million dollars) and the time it took them to create Miles Morales, Rift Apart, and Spider-Man 2, and the cost it took to create those 3 games compared to the money it took Microsoft to buy Zenimax (7.5 billion dollars) and the revenue generated by all their games in the same time period... I can assure you that Starfield isn't a success in that story.

Starfield was in development for 8 years with a studio larger than Insomniacs. That game was extremely expensive to develop and almost certainly costs more than 200 million dollars.

If you told Phil Spencer this was going to be the results of Starfield when he bought Zenimax, either he would have released it on PS5 to make up the development cost or he wouldn't have bought Zenimax at all.
Yeah not talking about the economy, I have no insight there. But MS can probably pick Phil’s nose and find 200m USD. It’s no real issue right now. I’m just talking about gamers discovering a game and being interested enough to try it. 11 million on Xbox Series, Steam and Microsoft Store is certainly not bad, even more so if half on the players are on Xbox, which is a small platform today.

I’d like to know the Steam Microsoft Store split. It’s doing okay on Steam with 20-60k concurrent players 2 months after release and no online mode, but I think the drop off is going too fast. I’d like to know if it’s the same on the MS Store version. I think they need to get the modding tools out asap. The concurrent player number will likely drop below Skyrim if they wait until next year. The game needs some new blood to create hype and give it legs.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
You boys can spin the numbers as much as you like but Starfield has been a commercial succes, however not as big as ms or their loyal followers would have liked it to be. 10 milion players, what does that mean. Record new gp subs, we want Numbers! And do they count the 1 dollar for two weeks promo’s? You can bet your ass they do. Starfield did not sell more consoles so its safe to assume most xbox players where allready in their ecosystem.

Starfield has been huge. No doubt about it. Every single person in my office is still playing it. That's 8 people but we are a pc gaming company. We have multiple offices and many people are still playing the game.

Starfield and balders gate 3 are the biggest PC games in the company. I don't see how that is anything but a success when everyone is playing either cyberpunk, balders gate 3 or staffield right now.
 
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