Player stats, sales, and reception discussion

[Askia Muhammad]

I think they’re in denial. Firaxis and its Reddit bots are insisting on this narrative that “everything is fine” in spite of the numbers. Look at the posters here who are promoting theories of secret player counts that we can’t measure.

Corporate Take Two is validating the PR narrative that a few patches and updates will right the ship. There’s zero acknowledgment of the massive development failure or even strategic design mistakes.

Moderator Action: *SNIP* This talk is not allowed in the gaming forums. Stop now!. -lymond

If you’ve ever been in a meeting with investors, you’d know that admitting to any failure and/or suggesting things are negative are big no nos.

Investor meetings are all about spinning numbers and narratives. The silence here suggests it must really not be doing great for there to be nothing to spin.

For example, even if a game doesn’t sell well, companies will typically highlight high retention or excessive spending from “whales”. In the case of Civ 7, where it appears retention is probably its largest single biggest weakness, I would have expected them to highlight initial sales and ignore the reception. The fact we’ve heard neither to me is not a good sign.

 

[stealth_nsk]

I think we have sufficient data to construct a framework for making inferences. It is certainly possible that those inferences could be off. But aren't we working with more data than archaeologists often have when proclaiming epochs of history?

I think not. Archeologists work with huge amount of data. Even for neolithic, I believe the number of archaeological sites numbers in millions.

If we look at this thread, people often look at number of simultaneous Steam players and, sometimes at Steam reviews only. Even if those would cover all the platforms, those metrics would loosely correlate with game sales. But they don't and we have a couple of hints that Steam has less than half of Civ7 sales. If that's true, we have a huge blank spot even in those metrics. And we have no direct data to confirm whether it's true or not.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

This doesn't seem remotely plausible to me. What is your source for these claims?

In particular, the claim that Romans had the death penalty for anyone who would disclose these secrets. How could we come to know that? What could possibly be the historical source for that little piece of information? They couldn't publish that death penalty (without disclosing the existence of the secrets themselves). So did they only communicate it to the people to whom the secrets were made known ("If you ever tell anyone about this, we'll whack ya!")? But if so, and if the cognoscenti held their tongue because of the threat, then how has the existence of the threat (and the knowledge) come to be known since then? What body was the keeper of the secret? What form did the secret knowledge take? Sea charts? And those have survived somewhere?

Sorry, I know this is a tangent, but . . . SO many questions.

Autotranslate Italian history channels and you'll find some.
Just some.
You'll need to learn Latin and translate some sources by yourself if you want the bigger picture...
I'm not going to list here the amount of books I read in Latin...
You have any idea how many books have written Pliny the Elder alone???
99% of the Greek Elites moved to Italy when the Byzantine Christians started killing everyone there... I also have SO many questions... I DONT have any answer to...
My father was a History teacher. My Grandfather a publisher of History books. I am my own source.

Sea charts, coded text, absolutely yes.
We have a giant Earth map inside the Vatican Pope quarter, 3x6mt wide, that we know has been painted around 1420 AD. Complete. With Australia, Antarctica (with rivers)...
To my knowledge it exist maybe one single picture of it taken by a smartphone. It is forbidden to enter the room to everyone except the Pope himself....

 

[Gori the Grey]

Autotranslate Italian history channels and you'll find some.
Just some.
You'll need to learn Latin and translate some sources by yourself if you want the bigger picture...
I'm not going to list here the amount of books I read in Latin...
You have any idea how many books have written Pliny the Elder alone???

Ok, this answer tells me that the claim is bogus.

When one makes a historical claim, one can direct one's readers to the specific primary text that supports that claim.

If the reference to these sea charts and the death penalty connected to them appears in Pliny the Elder, just point me to the appropriate passage in Naturalis Historia and I'll go look it up myself. I read Latin.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

Ok, this answer tells me that the claim is bogus.

When one makes a historical claim, one can direct one's readers to the specific primary text that supports that claim.

If the reference to these sea charts and the death penalty connected to them appears in Pliny the Elder, just point me to the appropriate passage in Naturalis Historia and I'll go look it up myself. I read Latin.

Your patience is that of a porcupine.
I am my sources.

Read Pliny the Elder Book third of the Naturae collection. Chapter 8. Bogus you say?
Care to verify?
Come back when you are done researching this one source.

Does this correspond to your research?

LacusCurtius • Pliny the Elder's Natural History — Book 3

The complete Latin text of Book III of the Historia Naturalis of C. Plinius Secundus.

penelope.uchicago.edu

Then on the inner coast are the towns of Barbesula with the river, likewise Salduba, the town of Suel, Malaca with the river of the allies. Then Maenuba with the river, Sexi surnamed Firmum Iulium, Sel, Abdara, Murgi, the end of Baetica. Marcus Agrippa considered that coast to be the origin of the Carthaginians throughout the world; but from Ana, facing the Atlantic Ocean, it is the coast of the Bastuli and Turduli. Marcus Varro reports that Iberians and Persians and Phoenicians and Celts and Carthaginians reached all of Spain. For the sport of Libera the father or the lyssa of the Bacchants with him gave the name to Lusitania and Pan the prefect of its whole. But I consider the things that are told about Hercules and Pyrenees or Saturn to be particularly fabulous.


You see? I got this from MEMORY... now do you understand what I mean when I say " I am my own source"?
No the death penalty is not there and I am not giving you this answer.
This is part of a broader research and it's not publicly available.
Even if I wanted to, I cannot grant you access to this sources.
Scrap the death penalty part if you want, and move on, please.

Therefore, you are not the Pope, please don't be so foolish.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

This is also a source, but it is behind a paywall...
For this I tell you, I have studied a lot, on Italian Public and private libraries.

Roma contro Cartagine, terra contro mare

I romani furono una potenza navale, non marittima. Le onde servivano solo come proiezione della potenza militare e per debellare la minaccia punica. Lo scontro…

www.limesonline.com

I did read the corpus of Pliny the Elder in a library.


I can give you the library location... It's in Turin, Italy.
It's called fondazione Einaudi.

Homepage IT - Fondazione Luigi Einaudi

Fondazione Luigi Einaudi: un punto di riferimento per una ricerca libera e inclusiva nelle Scienze Sociali. Visita il sito

www.fondazioneeinaudi.it

 

[civlateintothenights]

It took us two years after the launch of Civ VI to receive a proper, full expansion. Do you think we are looking at the same timeline now?

Unless player numbers start to increase with patches and DLC, more leader/Civ DLC would be all we can expect imo. Not worth it to make an expansion at the current player base.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Lazy Sweeper, if you have committed some passages of Pliny's Natural History to memory, more power to you! That's impressive.

This is a description of some towns and rivers of modern day Spain. The Carthaginians are mentioned because they settled this region. But, even setting aside the fact that there is no reference to the death penalty, there's no reference here to sea routes to present day America!

Moreover, Pliny has never, to the best of my knowledge, been secret.

I found your initial claim implausible, and now you refuse to substantiate it.

You are correct on one point at least: I am not the Pope.

And I am happy to move on.

 

[Askia Muhammad]

Unless player numbers start to increase with patches and DLC, more leader/Civ DLC would be all we can expect imo. Not worth it to make an expansion at the current player base.

Definitely not worth it, as expansions, particularly the first one, never outsell the original game. If you assume the current audience is near the daily player numbers it doesn’t make any sense to produce an expansion for 10,000 players, probably at least 40% of which wouldn’t purchase the expansion.

They’ve got to get some interest going in the game and the patches have to win back some players.

I’m sorry but the idea that more than half the playerbase isn’t playing on PC is unfounded and complete copium. The civilization series is a PC first product. Yes, they’ve been disseminating it across platforms since Civ 6 on a wide scale but to even suggest “most or even half of the active player base” is outside the PC market is pure fantasy and copium being administered at medically unsafe levels.

There isn’t a single large streamer or content creator regularly covering the game either - that’s another very concerning sign. I’m not even getting civilization 7 content shown to me on YT and half the videos I watch are 4x related

 

[CliffCo]

While i could include the link here, i'm not sure if it would be against the rules or not, but in an interview with IGN the CEO of Take-Two, Strauss Zelnick made these comments.

“I'm thrilled with Civ 7 so far,”

“However, there were some issues initially, and our team at Firaxis has done a great job addressing those issues. There's more work to be done. I'm optimistic that work will be done and will suit consumers, and ultimately that we have a very successful title on our hands.”

“The history of all the Civilization releases is that initially some of the changes that we make cause consternation among our consumers because they love the Civilization franchise so much,”

“And then people realize, oh, this really is an improvement and over a long sales cycle, we do really well. I think that's what'll happen here too."

“But undoubtedly, we had some issues in the beginning, which we've addressed partially and continue to address.”

 

[Gori the Grey]

It was posted a page back.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

Lazy Sweeper, if you have committed some passages of Pliny's Natural History to memory, more power to you! That's impressive.

This is a description of some towns and rivers of modern day Spain. The Carthaginians are mentioned because they settled this region. But, even setting aside the fact that there is no reference to the death penalty, there's no reference here to sea routes to present day America!

Moreover, Pliny has never, to the best of my knowledge, been secret.

I found your initial claim implausible, and now you refuse to substantiate it.

You are correct on one point at least: I am not the Pope.

And I am happy to move on.

You need to cross the Ocean for being able to interpret Pliny correctly.

In my view he , albeit not so clearly for us, which do not know exactly if he's talking of Saturn the king or else...
does suggests there are lands the other side of the Ocean the Carthage knew how to reach, in this
exact passage. Its Origin throughout the world... Ana (?) facing the Atlantic Ocean...

Tnx for being patient... I write slowly sometime very slowly when I try to access my memory...

 

[Stoic]

Definitely not worth it, as expansions, particularly the first one, never outsell the original game. If you assume the current audience is near the daily player numbers it doesn’t make any sense to produce an expansion for 10,000 players, probably at least 40% of which wouldn’t purchase the expansion.

They’ve got to get some interest going in the game and the patches have to win back some players.

I’m sorry but the idea that more than half the playerbase isn’t playing on PC is unfounded and complete copium. The civilization series is a PC first product. Yes, they’ve been disseminating it across platforms since Civ 6 on a wide scale but to even suggest “most or even half of the active player base” is outside the PC market is pure fantasy and copium being administered at medically unsafe levels.

There isn’t a single large streamer or content creator regularly covering the game either - that’s another very concerning sign. I’m not even getting civilization 7 content shown to me on YT and half the videos I watch are 4x related

But without an expansion they want to close the game? In my opinion they are trying

 

[Lazy sweeper]

But without an expansion they want to close the game? In my opinion they are trying

Switch 2 comes out June 5. Civ VII is expected to be in a good state at launch there will probably be some owners of Civ VII that are playing it on the Switch 1 that will update
the version for the Switch 2. The date is three weeks from now. Receive a good review for the Switch 2 version will pump in some Oxygen.
Pockettactics says Civ series has 25% of the total share of tactical - turn based - 4x games on the Switch.

Sid Meier dominates sales charts with Civilization 7, regardless of what the reviews say

Civilization 7 released to a rocky reception, but it appears to be selling perfectly fine regardless of what both players and critics say.

www.pockettactics.com

I have no idea of the actual numbers but 150 mil Switch 1 sales is a good pool. They just need to try release a bit more physical copies, and collectors would empty the shelves in 0.1 nanoseconds.
They would get far better return on investment to release a physical civ 6 deluxe remastered for Switch 2 than leaving it digital only, even at discounted price, which Idk if they can even do it bc of the
Nin E-shop agreements I have zero idea how that works... the article however is trying to give a positive view... reliable source???

What if Nintendo would make a card writer machine like they did with the famicon disk back in the 80s.
Kids could get games on a blank disk, even multiple titles, at the machine, pay and go home and play.
Nintendo has the power to do that machine - e-shop writer- replica and allow everyone to buy a 64or 256gb card, fill it with digital only games so they can be played offline, and
could also provide the service to every third party publisher to download their games on this compilation cards...
3rd party publishers can not do this without Nin.
It's a one way only Highway.

 

[Leucarum]

I will say that I am getting a lot of use out of the Steam Deck Civ7. I travel relatively often and it is a godsend! For all that people complain about the interface on PC, it does work well on handheld. My only gripe is the interface creating popups having more information than the screen is designed to show. I could definitely buy that handheld sales were bouying the launch.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

I will say that I am getting a lot of use out of the Steam Deck Civ7. I travel relatively often and it is a godsend! For all that people complain about the interface on PC, it does work well on handheld. My only gripe is the interface creating popups having more information than the screen is designed to show. I could definitely buy that handheld sales were bouying the launch.

Can you access the game config files???

use * to search inside civ 7 files if exist windows rules...

<windowRule identifier="*"><action name="Maximize"/></windowRule>

 

[Askia Muhammad]

While i could include the link here, i'm not sure if it would be against the rules or not, but in an interview with IGN the CEO of Take-Two, Strauss Zelnick made these comments.

“I'm thrilled with Civ 7 so far,”

“However, there were some issues initially, and our team at Firaxis has done a great job addressing those issues. There's more work to be done. I'm optimistic that work will be done and will suit consumers, and ultimately that we have a very successful title on our hands.”

“The history of all the Civilization releases is that initially some of the changes that we make cause consternation among our consumers because they love the Civilization franchise so much,”

“And then people realize, oh, this really is an improvement and over a long sales cycle, we do really well. I think that's what'll happen here too."

“But undoubtedly, we had some issues in the beginning, which we've addressed partially and continue to address.”

So they really are delusional lol

 

[Core Imposter]

So now we are hearing that they have sold millions of console units? So the game is not doing well on the PC. Maybe the game was not intended to be a PC game first and foremost? Is that what we are hearing?

 

[CliffCo]

Look at Ubisoft, they’ve already sold well over 2 million copies of AC Shadows but their shares fell in value by 18% yesterday.

Seems like the gaming industry in general has been going through hard times recently.

 

[ThERat]

Look at Ubisoft, they’ve already sold well over 2 million copies of AC Shadows but their shares fell in value by 18% yesterday.

Seems like the gaming industry in general has been going through hard times recently.

Deservedly so. Ubisoft being one of the worst offenders. I fondly remember their Settlers 3 game. Gone downhill ever since.
Gaming companies for far too long have tried to sell undercooked products for premium costs.