Player stats, sales, and reception speculation thread

[nakzox]

While kids going back to school definitely plays a factor in player counts (obviously), I don't know how many of those kids were playing Civ VII in the first place.

My first Civ game was V when I was a teen, but the media and entertainment landscape has changed so much since then. I always assumed the Civ series was mainly a more adult/mature fanbase than other popular games, but I could just be living under a rock.

It's probably pretty likely that most school-aged kids that bought Civ VII likely checked out from it months ago.

Of course, I am sure that some of the drop could be attributed to kids going back to school, I just don't think it is as much as could be implied by the lower player counts in recent weeks.

 

[Kev1916]

Your kid went back at school by the last two weeks of school? What?

Read it again, we all make mistake's

If you don't think students aged 10 - 25 across most of Europe, China, Russia & a lot of US states who all go back to school in early September and therefore have less time to play games doesn't affect the player count then I don't know what to tell you. It's common sense.

Again if your trying to be Smart , your original post to quote was "" Presumably this reflects the average age of each of these Civ games as kids go back to school.

In the UK the oldest will be 18 not sure what part of the world you live in that would class a kid when there over 18 .., your bad, thou you enjoy your night

 

[Crashdummy]

I will never understand what is so bad about snowballing. I think it's the amazingly satisfying gift for playing really well. If it happens in too many games and you find the game too easy, increase difficulty. Ideally, the game should have a difficulty for which even playing really well you have a 50-50 chance of losing. Chopping the game into age transitions to kneecap people that play the game very well is very, very strange to me. It's like trying to make Magnus Carlson enjoy a chess game against a novice teenager and every time Magnus pulls ahead someone gives the teen three queens and a knight to even things out. Does anyone think Magnus would enjoy such games for long? If snowballing is an issue, all we need is competent AI. Not "rubber band" gimmicks.

I have been saying this since months ago

Snowballing is GOOD, if you play well in the early game, you SHOULD be rewarded

The problem is AI and difficulty, not snowballing, but Firaxis refused to invest in the real problem and tried to implement the cheaper and worse alternative

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

And then there’s the path you have to follow just to play as some favorite civilizations. If I want to play as France, I have to go through Rome and the Normans first, even though I don’t want to play as them at that moment. There are even worse cases, like Meiji Japan, where I first have to go through completely unrelated cultures such as the Khmer and Majapahit.

On one of the recent patches/updates, they now have an option where all civs are unlocked. So now you're no longer limited to having to play certain civs or do weird stuff in the game to unlock (looking at you Spain).

 

[IntelligentDisk]

Again if your trying to be Smart , your original post to quote was "" Presumably this reflects the average age of each of these Civ games as kids go back to school.

In the UK the oldest will be 18 not sure what part of the world you live in that would class a kid when there over 18 .., your bad, thou you enjoy your night

University or college is commonly called 'school' in America & China. Students are commonly referred to as kids too.

 

[Kwami]

Back to school means more work for parents, too. Taking kids to practice, watching school concerts, etc. And some adults take college classes, too.

 

[Siddorm]

Aren't back to school dates different in different countries?

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Aren't back to school dates different in different countries?

In geographically large countries, they're also at different dates in different parts of the country.

Hush, though, no need to spoil a good internet spat.

 

[IntelligentDisk]

Aren't back to school dates different in different countries?

That's correct. The majority north of the equator though (so 90% of the population) are early September including China, Europe, Russia, Japan, South Korea, Canada and some US states.

 

[Nikolai II]

That's correct. The majority north of the equator though (so 90% of the population) are early September including China, Europe, Russia, Japan, South Korea, Canada and some US states.

That's late. In Norway we start in the middle of August.

 

[IntelligentDisk]

That's late. In Norway we start in the middle of August.

Majority, not all.

 

[Nikolai II]

Majority, not all.

I said that was late. I did not claim anything about it being all.

 

[ColtSeavers]

Seriously guys, what are you discussing here!?

 

[Nikolai II]

Seriously guys, what are you discussing here!?

No idea, I just made an observation based on surprise.

 

[queenpea]

The number of reviews have also declined in the past week, suggesting that people who bought the game when it was on sale may have, on average, reviewed it quickly rather than waiting a while.

The positive/negative has gone back to being closer to July numbers, still negative but not as negative as during the discount period. Total reviews over the past seven days are 71 positive, 95 negative, 42.8% positive rating.

Does SteamDB show recent ratings? I see an overall score of only 47.22% positive, which is the lowest score I can recall seeing.

 

[Askia Muhammad]

I honestly don't see how expansions could be unreasonable financially. Expansions and (especially) DLCs are the things which actually make money for games with that business model. And Civ7 already sold millions of units (wild guess is 3-4 across all platforms by now), so expansions should at least pay for themselves even if the game as a whole will end up not being financially successful.

While kids going back to school definitely plays a factor in player counts (obviously), I don't know how many of those kids were playing Civ VII in the first place.

My first Civ game was V when I was a teen, but the media and entertainment landscape has changed so much since then. I always assumed the Civ series was mainly a more adult/mature fanbase than other popular games, but I could just be living under a rock.

It's probably pretty likely that most school-aged kids that bought Civ VII likely checked out from it months ago.

Of course, I am sure that some of the drop could be attributed to kids going back to school, I just don't think it is as much as could be implied by the lower player counts in recent weeks.

Small sample size perhaps but I work with both high school and college aged students. Over the past 8 years of me having done so across three institutions I’ve met a total of one student who even knew what Civ was.

 

[Kev1916]

That's late. In Norway we start in the middle of August.

Yep in Europe ( regions aside) about 10 start back in August, 13 in September

 

[Gorbles]

Seriously guys, what are you discussing here!?

Someone made a silly claim that because the genre has been around decades, that kids should not be involved in the franchise, and that's why we got the "slop" that was Civ VII.

Prior to this, people were talking about active player stats r.e. the start of the new academic year. Both kinda triggered downstream discussions.

 

[IntelligentDisk]

Norway & Scotland are low populous countries. Most of the more populated European countries - Russia, France, Italy, England, Spain, Poland, Ukraine - as well as smaller ones like Portugal, Greece, Hungary & Switzerland start September onwards. At least 75% of Europe start September onwards, could be as high as 90%.

 

[Wrenched]

For CCU numbers I am seeing the following 30-day Percent change in players:

Civilization V: -2.86%
Civilization VI: -6.25%
Civilization VII: -9.39%

Looks like Civ V has the best retention of school-age kids and stressed parents!