Online S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 on Steam dropped by 90% in three months — the last maximum was reached by 12,448 players

At the release, the peak online S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 on Steam reached 121,335 people, while in recent weeks, only 12,448 people have registered the maximum, according to SteamDB.

In fact, this situation is typical for story-driven games, as most gamers do not rush to return to the game after completing the campaign and additional content. Source Gamedev DOUwhich was the first to notice the decline, recalls that other AAA games, including Starfield, showed similar results, losing an average of 75-90% of their audience per quarter.

Bethesda’s role-playing space action game reached a maximum of 330 thousand at release, while in three months the online audience dropped to 30 thousand. Baldur’s Gate 3 (875 thousand vs. 200 thousand), Dragon Age: The Veilguard (89 thousand and 6 thousand), and Metaphor: ReFantazio (86 thousand vs. 13 thousand).

Last month, the founder of GSC Game World Sergey Grigorievich said that S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 paid off on the first day of salesbut did not specify the cost of development. According to preliminary estimates by the founder of the NAVI esports team, Oleksandr Kokhanovskyi, the game could cost the studio $30-60 million, while Smok Ventures investment partner Tomasz Koscielniak, who focuses on investments in game development, noted that We are talking about a budget of about $100 million.

Two weeks ago, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 also received a huge upgrade (and later patching a patch with a departure fix) with about 1700 changes related to character and mutant AI, A-Life shooting, stealth, balance, bugs, features, plot, locations, items, etc.