PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Exceeds Bluehole’s Sales Expecations
It’s been less than six months since the Early Access release of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and already the game has sold over 10 million copies. And that’s not all. It has also surpassed previously held records for the highest player count of any non-valve game on Steam. All of this, and it’s close to breaking the all-time concurrent player record held by Dota 2, however developer Bluehole never expected PUBG to be as successful as it’s been.
In a recent interview with Polygon, PlayerUnknown himself, Brendan Greene talked about his expectations of the game, as well as those of the developer. When he originally pitched the game to Bluehole, he predicted that Battlegrounds would sell 1 million copies within the first month. Sure, looking at how it actually sold in that time (2 million copies) might make you think that this was a realistic expectation, however this is not a game coming from a popular and successful franchise like Grand Theft Auto.
Bluehole had a very different prediction than Brendan Greene though. They only expected to sell 200,000 to 300,000 thousand units in the first year on the market. Imagine their surprise when it sold 10 times that within the first month after release! “A lot of the [internal team], they really couldn’t believe it,” Green said. “There was a few veterans of the game industry that were [saying], like, ‘No, no. 200,000 [or] 300,000 the first year.’ But then when we hit that first million, there were a lot of smiles around the office.”
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is currently available in Early Access on Steam for the PC, and an Xbox One version is coming later this year.
What do you think the reason is for the huge success of PUBG? Have you played it yet or are you planning on it? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.