As a hit-driven business, the great majority of the video game industry's software releases have been commercial disappointments. In the early 21st century, industry commentators made these general estimates: 10% of published games generated 90% of revenue;[1] that around 3% of PC games and 15% of console games have global sales of more than 100,000 units per year, with even this level insufficient to make high-budget games profitable;[2] and that about 20% of games make any profit.[3] Within years after Steam relaxed limits on which games could be digitally distributed on its service, they reported that around 80% of games failed to reach $5000 in revenue in their first two weeks of sales.[4]
Some of these failure events have drastically changed the video game market since its origin in the late 1970s. For example, the failure of E.T. contributed to the video game crash of 1983. Some games, though commercial failures, are well received by certain groups of gamers and are considered cult games.
The following list includes any video game software on any platform, and any video game console hardware where the commercial failure has been documented as such by the manufacture or published, or affirmed through industry sales trackers.
- ^ Mapping the Canadian Video and Computer Game Industry Archived March 16, 2016, at the Wayback Machine from The Canadian Video Game Industry with data from the (PDF)
- ^ Laramee, Francois Dominic (8 January 2018). Secrets of the Game Business. Charles River Media. ISBN 978-1-58450-282-1 – via Google Books.
- ^ Video Game Makers Go Hollywood. Uh-Oh. Archived May 28, 2015, at the Wayback Machine from The New York Times
- ^ Orland, Kyle (April 7, 2020). "Ars analysis: ~80% of Steam games earn under $5K in first two weeks".