The first figures for the launch of the PC version of Returnal are not encouraging. The former PS5 exclusive deserves better.
Within the editorial staff of Numerama, we love Returnal. The game, first released on PlayStation 5, is one of Sony’s best console titles. It is based on a super pleasant gameplay, taking advantage of the specificities of the DualSense (the adaptive triggers, in particular). When Sony formalized the PC port, we warmly applauded this desire to offer more luck to a video game that deserves it. But the launch is proving to be more than sluggish according to the first figures spotted by Video Game Chronicles on February 20.
As statistics provided by Valve’s platform-related database SteamDB show, the PC version of Returnal achieves the worst second launch for a title stamped PlayStation. At its biggest peak in traffic, it brought together less than 7,000 players, which is really low for a title that was just released (it has been available since February 15, 2023). Only Sackboy: A Big Adventure did worse, with barely 610 people online at the same time.
Returnal must not flop on PC
When we look at the figures for other ports of PlayStation games on PC, we see that there is normally a real appetite from the public. A title like god of war attracted more than 74,000 curious people, while Sony waited much longer to launch it on PC (less than two years for Returnalcompared to almost four years for god of war).
The success of PlayStation games on Steam at launch :
| Maximum Peak Players on Steam | |
|---|---|
| Returnal | 6,691 |
| god of war | 73,529 |
| Marvel’s Spider-Man | 66,436 |
| Horizon Zero Dawn | 56,557 |
| Sackboy: A Big Adventure | 610 |
| Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection | 10,851 |
It is sad to see that Returnal struggles to attract people, despite having a good reputation. On the Metacritic aggregator, it has a nice score of 86 out of 100, while the average for players is 7.3 out of 10 (probably due to its increased difficulty).
The PC port is excellent, according to some media. In its test published on February 15, GameSpot goes so far as to affirm: This frenetic third-person shooter, based on rogue-lite progression, has never felt more at home than on this platform. In addition to reaching a level of performance impossible on PS5, Returnal comes with new graphics settings, new upscaling options and a tool model that allows you to fine-tune your experience. “And by connecting a DualSense to your PC, you can enjoy the same key configuration as on PS5.
Subscribe to Numerama on Google News to not miss any news!