Outriders was released last year in April, and it was actually a good looter-shooter by Poeple Can Fly. The beginning was quite lively, but then the numbers started falling once the initial hype was over. In August, People Can Fly expressed its disappointment regarding the publisher Square Enix keeping them in the dark about game’s current level of success. It appears to have a reason now, as the game is not doing that well as expected.
A new financial report surfaced from the studio, and the report says that they were entitled to royalty payments in case of game selling well enough. As they did not receive any such royalty payments from the publisher, it is now understood more clearly that the profit from Outriders was not enough to cover the publisher’s costs in the first place. For a game which was announced as “Square Enix’s next major franchise”, this sounds unfortunate.
There is another point about the great beginning, which should not be forgotten. When Outriders was released, it was also available on Xbox Game Pass. So many people had a chance to try it, yet they just moved on after a short while.
People Can Fly is now working on the upcoming expansion Worldslayer, planned for a 2022 release. But there is not any expection of such royalty payments from this content either. This case shows that the initial player count may be hugely misleading.
