Epic Games Is Making Sales With Its Free-To-Play IP
Success in live service is being defined by Fortnite, who is not only reaching record-breaking user activity but record-breaking sales. Despite its story as a free-to-play experience, the popular battle royale mode sold a whopping 5 million Battle Basses during its first day of Season 3.
Via Epic Games, Wedbush Securities Analyst Michael Pachter discovered that the Fortnite developer accumulated $50 million in sales in just one day. The analyst attributes this success to Epic’s clever business model, which he called “Super Smart.”
“You can play Game Pass forever by spending $10 once. It’s super smart,” Pachter said in an interview with Games Beat. “People are going to see that somebody has that hard-to-get skin, and more people will sign up for the Game Pass. Epic told me 12 weeks ago that the one that started 12 weeks ago, they sold 5 million Game Passes the first day. $50 million in a day? That’s a good business model. I think a lot of publishers are going to copy that and move to cosmetics so nobody complains about pay-to-win.”
As GamesIndustry.biz noted in their coverage, it’s plausible that a large number of Battle Pass transactions were made using V-Bucks. During the previous season, the player who accomplished all 100 tasks associated with Battle Pass could acquire enough V-Bucks to purchase the next season’s. Nevertheless, the sheer volume of sales for Season 3 is staggering. Furthermore, judging by last month’s record-breaking numbers, Fortnite: Battle Royale is only increasing in popularity and player count. April saw the developer win $296 million across PC, console, and mobile according to SuperData. Therefore, it seems all but assured that Epic Games will top themselves in the consecutive financial reports.
Expect additional updates on the state of Fortnite and the Battle Royale genre as we move forward. And let us know your thoughts. Are you surprised by the number of sold Battle Passes? Comment down below.
SOURCE: GI.biz