Gaming
According to Sega, the Sonic franchise has sold and downloaded more than 1.5 billion units
Both full premium game sales and downloads of the various Sonic free-to-play games that have been released over the years are included in this figure.
While the franchise enjoyed high sales during its heyday in the 1990s and maintained a sizable fan base despite the mixed reviews and poor sales of several games in the 2000s, the explosive growth of the mobile industry has propelled the Sonic series to new heights.
Sega has made several mobile games since 2013, including Sonic Dash, Sonic Runners, Sonic Dash 2: Sonic Boom, and Sonic Runners Adventures. These games have microtransactions but are otherwise free to play.
It becomes evident that a large portion of the 1.51 billion figure is made up of free-to-play mobile downloads when you take into account the several sequels and free-to-play versions of the original Sonic games.
For instance, Sonic Dash, the most well-known of the endless runner games, is said to have amassed over 500 million downloads as of 2021, accounting for more than one-third of the franchise’s total units with only one game.
A 2017 smartphone game called Sonic Forces: Speed Battle has had 94 million downloads as of April 2022.
As it displays badges showing how many times popular games have been downloaded, Google’s Play store also provides some insight into how the games have done.
While Sonic Forces, a number of other Sonic games, including a rerelease of the franchise’s debut game, have the 50+ Million downloads icon, Sonic Dash has the 100 Million+ downloads badge.
Although this isn’t conclusive proof because it’s not obvious if Google considers re-downloading the game as a new download or if it’s based only on user accounts that have accessed the game, it does highlight how well-liked the franchise is on mobile devices.
Although Sega has rarely provided concrete information on the sales of the series’ premium games, it did state last year that Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games in Tokyo 2020, Team Sonic Racing, Sonic Mania, and Sonic Generations hPlayad collectively sold more than 4,400,000 units during its 2021 fiscal year.
For November 8, 2022, Sonic Frontiers, Sonic’s upcoming high-profile adventure, will be available on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PS5, PS4, Switch, and PC.
Since the excellent Baldur’s Gate 3 has been out in the wild for a while, interesting data can be gleaned, such as how players choose to play an innovative new RPG from home. Stats from developer Larian Studios and posted on the PlayStation Blog show that most people want to play as a stealthy archer like in Skyrim when given nearly limitless options.
According to a fascinating graph, Rogue/Ranger is the most popular multiclass build, with over 175,000 players using it to snipe unsuspecting enemies from range. The next two builds reveal similarly. 150,000 played Barbarian/Fighter because they loved pummeling things, and 109,00 played Barbarian/Paladin, which lets players talk to their victims before beatings.
More sense emerges as you descend. If the Paladin/Warlock/Sorcerer/Bard has high Charisma, any combination can be interesting. Charisma helps these classes cast spells and abilities and interact with NPCs outside of combat.
Playing a single class through Baldur’s Gate 3 feels great, which is what most players do. A pure Fighter or Wizard becomes so powerful by game’s end that we don’t blame you for not mixing things up!
Play as a Tiefling Oathbreaker Paladin, Dark Urge Origin (which you must resist), or Bard for real moral dilemmas. You could also play pseudo-Aragorn again.
Techland is continuing to release Dying Light 2 content as part of its long-term support. This is surprising since the meaty Good Night, Good Luck update was released a few months ago. It’s nice to know what’s coming, but no timeline was given.
IGN-exclusive roadmap trailers reveal more co-op missions, board quests, a tower raid, and replayable GRE anomalies. Executions and finishers may be added to the April Gut Feeling update, which overhauled melee mechanics. Graphical options, weapon repair, gear, and mod dismantling are always welcome.
Knives, polearms, and more enemy variants are coming, including a Nightmare difficulty. Changes to NG+ include firearms. Players can finally dress to their hearts’ content with new cosmetic options.
Has Techland’s Dying Light 2 support lured you back? Would you rather focus on something new?
Epic Games expanded the Fortnite V-Buck “pricing alignment” after laying off almost 900 employees, citing “inflation and currency fluctuations”. Fortnite’s premium currency will rise in international markets, including the largest.
Epic Games will raise the price of V-Bucks and real money content packs in the Czech Republic, Denmark, Eurozone countries, Hungary, Japan, Norway, Poland, Romania, Sweden, Turkey, and the US (including all US Dollar storefronts) on October 27.
Raising the price of this fictitious currency was successful when the company trialed it in the UK, Canada, and Mexico, so it was decided to announce it worldwide now. These USD increases range from $1 (1000 V-Bucks, previous $7.99) to $10 (13,500 V-Bucks, previous $79.99).
How do you view Epic’s timing and pricing increase?
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