According to Gamasutra, Firewatch backer and co-creator, Panic Inc.took only 24 hours to recouperate its investment in the PS4 and Steam hit once it launched back in February of 2015. That is a stellar turnaround!
While looking back on the design studio’s partnership with Campo Santo in a recent blog post, Panic co-founder Cabel Sasser, also revealed the mystery title went on to sell over 500,000 full-price copies in its first month. Commenting specifically on the sales of the game and what Panic Inc. had hoped for, Sasser had this to say:
“Panic’s metric for Firewatch’s success was probably calibrated a little bit differently than Campo Santo’s: of course we wanted to make the best possible game we could, but we also had made an investment we really hoped to recoup.Â
How’d it go? Firewatch’s budget, while huge for us, was modest for a game of its quality and scope, but we made our investment back in about one day.”
He went on gushing of course, pointing out that Firewatch had even taken top digital download honors for the month of February. Now just because we’ve seen the success of Firewatch come and go (well not REALLY go, but you know what we mean), that doesn’t mean we’ve seen the last of this partnership. Sasser was quickly back in the office’s of Campo Santo while they colluded over what could be next for the team.
Commenting on how he felt about the whole experience, Sasser kept it mostly simple, “We’re so grateful. And relieved. But mostly grateful.”