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Amnesia hits ~200k copies sold, developers can now afford food. Console port possible

S

subversus

I've done nothing with my life except eat and fap
Hoorah!

http://frictionalgames.blogspot.com/2011/01/four-months-after-amnesias-release.html

Let's start with what I guess people are most interested in - sales. When counting all online sales as well a the Russian retail copies, we have now sold almost 200, 000 units! This is a tremendous amount and more than we ever thought we would. Our "dream estimates" before release was something around 100k, and to be able to double that feels insane.


Note that more than half of these units have been sold at a discounted price (with as much has 75% of the price off), so the total earnings are not as much as it first sounds. Still, we are in incredible good financial situation right now. Also, the daily sales are still quite high and the average has not dropped below 200 units yet. This means that we can still pay all daily costs from these sales alone, allowing us to invest the other earnings into the future (for outsourcing, PR, etc). It also gives us a healthy buffer and allow us to manage any unexpected happenings the future might hold.

With these figures at hand, we must confess that it gives us new confidence for the PC. The sales that we have had (and are having) are more than enough to motivate developing a game with the PC as the main (and even only) platform. Based on what we have seen, the online PC market is just getting bigger and bigger, and we are convinced we are far from the end of this growth. We think that other developers that consider making their game exclusive to a console might want to think again.
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edit:

so good

There is another really important thing that needs to be taken into account: If we have had a publisher and sold according to current figures, we would not be in the state that we are in now. More likely, we would now be something more like our first sales summary post. We would probably just have paid back our advance, and just recently been receiving royalties (at a much lower rate, like 25% of what we get now). This means that we would probably be looking for a new publishing deal at this point instead of having the freedom we now have. This does not mean that publishers are evil, just that one should think carefully before signing up for anything. Releasing a game without any financial backing or help with marketing is quite a struggle, but if you pull it off it is well worth the effort!
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I love and hate Amnesia. I love it because it's amazing, but I hate it because I'm too much of a bitch to play it with the lights off. =(
 
I'm glad the internet hype worked in getting people to buy in. This game is really fantastic and deserves all the success it gets.
 
Well deserved. It deserves to sell millions tbh. One of the best pc games I played and it costs less than dinner at a good restaurant.
 
January 7, 2011. I walk over to the computer to check on a blog for a talented developer. To my amazement, they sold close to 200,000 copies of their game, Amnesia. I was beside myself and had to congratulate them on this victory. It was a good day. Daniel, your story has been heard.
 
Congratulations guys - positive word of mouth over an extremely well made horror game that is actually, genuinely creepy worked out for you!! It's amazing to hear such a success story considering the pittance they worked with when making the game initially.

Don't get too careless when making your next game and you'll continue getting the fame (and fortunes!) you deserve. : D

Also I agree with them on the publisher blurb - publishers are not evil (in fact a lot of them are really awesome) but it's not impossible to make it on your own and 100% of the profits go straight to you too, so don't be afraid to go it alone if you can.
 
Well, I'm one of those 200'000. Bought mine yesterday. Haven't played much yet though. Hope it's good.

Would be nice if they ported their future games to the consoles as well, since I prefer playing on my PS3 to my laptop.
 
Neon_Icarus said:
Well, I'm one of those 200'000. Bought mine yesterday. Haven't played much yet though. Hope it's good.

Would be nice if they ported their future games to the consoles as well, since I prefer playing on my PS3 to my laptop.
Click to expand...

they plan to do it, but through some 3rd party

As for our plans to focus on consoles, as hinted above, this is something we are reconsidering. If online sales figures continue like they have with Amnesia, there is actually not any reason for us to release to anything but PC. Still, it would be foolish not to try consoles out and our current idea is to work together with a third party to do a port. This would mean that we can still can keep a small staff and not risk growing beyond our capabilities.
Click to expand...
 
We're going to make it 200,001. Then we'll go to 200,002, and 200,003, 200,004, 200,005! AND THEN WE'RE GOING TO HAVE A SEQUEL!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRH
 
Dipper145 said:
I'm too scared to even buy this game.
Click to expand...

It just has kind of a creepy atmosphere. There's nothing like the cheap "dog jumping through the window" scare in Resident Evil, for example.

The atmosphere was kind of reminiscent of Demon's Souls.
 
poppabk said:
As a point of comparison Shadow Complex became the highest selling single player game on xbox live when it sold a similar amount in its first week, meaning that all other single player titles had sold less than 200k on xbox live at that point.
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Less than 200k in their first week, not total as you seem to suggest.

The companies, along with Microsoft, said the game is the most-downloaded single-player game in Xbox Live Arcade history for the first week.
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http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=25088
 
I chipped in as soon as the preorder on their site went up, before the game was even Steamworks.

I'll do it again for their next game. I'm not a big preorder guy, but when I know that my preorder dollars are going straight to the developers during the production cycle, sign me up.

Congrats Frictional.
 
HK got me the game as a gift and I'm not entirely sure he did it to be nice. This game is nerve racking. I can't go more than 30 minutes or so at a time.
 
gregor7777 said:
HK got me the game as a gift and I'm not entirely sure he did it to be nice. This game is nerve racking. I can't go more than 30 minutes or so at a time.
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yes, once you meet your first enemy, it's very hard to continue.

3 years ago these guys would be nowhere. The horror game with no fighting exclusive to PC? C'mon! Thanks to digital distribution we'll see more success stories like this one.
 
subversus said:
yes, once you meet your first enemy, it's very hard to continue.

3 years ago these guys would be nowhere. The horror game with no fighting exclusive to PC? C'mon! Thanks to digital distribution we'll see more success stories like this one.
Click to expand...

And hopefully the same mentality will move over to consoles in the next few years. It's getting close, but getting it more open and welcoming, will make it easier for smaller devs to make it big.
 
Fuck yeah. Bring more goodness, Frictional, specifically horror goodness, you do it so well.

Edit: Frictional more like Frightional.
 
subversus said:
they plan to do it, but through some 3rd party
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That sounds great. Though, judging from the videos I've seen of it, I guess the interface really requires a mouse to work well. Perhaps with Move support...?
 
frictionalgames.blogspot.com said:
How has these awards and nominations been us PR wise? Unfortunately it is a bit hard to say as all were announced during the Christmas sales, a time when sales where much higher than usual. Now when it is over, we do see around a 75% increase in daily sales compared to before the Christmas sale started. We think the awards and nominations are part of this increase, but the increase in new players during the holidays have probably also helped spreading the word and boost the sales.
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We've been hearing this a lot.
 
I'm one of those that bought it :D I'm very I glad I did! Sure, I'm a total bitch when I play it, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't love it. The first time I played it I played it over Skype with four of us in the call. Can't wait to do it again :P
 
I find the indie dev goes from rags to riches on the PC via digital distribution trend very inspiring. recent examples being:

Tripwire
Dylan Fitterer (Audiosurf guy)
Runic
Carpe Fulgur
Insert a bunch of Eastern European Devs here
Frictional

Who's next? I for one think that Team Meat is about due for a tell-all sales update blog post!
 
Akia said:
I find the indie dev goes from rags to riches on the PC via digital distribution trend very inspiring. recent examples being:

Tripwire
Dylan Fitterer (Audiosurf guy)
Runic
Carpe Fulgur
Insert a bunch of Eastern European Devs here
1C
Frictional
Click to expand...
Super Meat Boy duo are probably millionaires by now. :lol
 
One of the best developers of horror games is doing well. There is hope for the genre after all. :)
 
Akia said:
I find the indie dev goes from rags to riches on the PC via digital distribution trend very inspiring. recent examples being:

Tripwire
Dylan Fitterer (Audiosurf guy)
Runic
Carpe Fulgur
Insert a bunch of Eastern European Devs here
1C
Frictional

Who's next? I for one think that Team Meat is about due for a tell-all sales update blog post!
Click to expand...

If we are talking about same 1C then they hardly count as Indy since they have been among biggest publishers/developers in russia over a decade.

BTW how big is the team behind Amnesia ? I remember someone saying 9 people plus some outsourcing (sound and soundtrack) is it true ? If so then kudos to them. Amazing game from a such small team.
 
I don't see talk of a console port. Misleading title is misleading.
 
TheSeks said:
I don't see talk of a console port. Misleading title is misleading.
Click to expand...

As for our plans to focus on consoles, as hinted above, this is something we are reconsidering. If online sales figures continue like they have with Amnesia, there is actually not any reason for us to release to anything but PC. Still, it would be foolish not to try consoles out and our current idea is to work together with a third party to do a port. This would mean that we can still can keep a small staff and not risk growing beyond our capabilities.
Click to expand...

...
 
CiSTM said:
BTW how big is the team behind Amnesia ? I remember someone saying 9 people plus some outsourcing (sound and soundtrack) is it true ? If so then kudos to them. Amazing game from a such small team.
Click to expand...

Five people. Pretty impressive. I played till I saw one of those things and then promptly took a long (ongoing) break. Will attempt to be a man this weekend.
 
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