Creative Assembly’s Total War: Warhammer had a huge launch last year when the turn-based strategy game debuted on Steam at #4 with a peak of 112k players.
Now, after the success of the first installment, the team at CA are already back with a sequel. And with such a quick turnaround time, Total War: Warhammer II has surprisingly been even more well-received with better reviews overall than the original.
The problem, however, is that far less have actually played the sequel. Over its launch weekend, Total War: Warhammer II once again brought the franchise back to the #4 spot on Steam, but peaked at 72k concurrent players – a drop of 36% when compared to the original.
Total War: Warhammer II’s Peak Players per Hour on Steam via GitHyp
Total War: Warhammer’s Peak Players per Hour on Steam via GitHyp
Based on the reviews alone, Total War: Warhammer II has been considered the developers’ best work yet. But putting scores aside and focusing on player counts, it seems like Creative Assembly and Sega might have chosen to release the sequel a bit too soon.
Releasing the follow up a little over a year after the last title is clearly an effort by the devs and publisher to strike while the iron is hot and before the original’s player base drops to under 10k players an hour on the weekends. A move that would seem like the right sales call with the sequel’s strong #4 debut being a clear sign that fans still want more Total War.
Yet, the drop-off in players is also a sign that many have already had their Total War fix and the successful launches of similar turn-based games recently such as Divinity: Original Sin II have also taken a large chunk of previous players.
Total War: Warhammer II Debuts with 36% Less Players Than the Original on Steam
The sequel’s strong launch much lower than last year’s first installment in the franchise
Creative Assembly’s Total War: Warhammer had a huge launch last year when the turn-based strategy game debuted on Steam at #4 with a peak of 112k players.
Now, after the success of the first installment, the team at CA are already back with a sequel. And with such a quick turnaround time, Total War: Warhammer II has surprisingly been even more well-received with better reviews overall than the original.
The problem, however, is that far less have actually played the sequel. Over its launch weekend, Total War: Warhammer II once again brought the franchise back to the #4 spot on Steam, but peaked at 72k concurrent players – a drop of 36% when compared to the original.
Total War: Warhammer II’s Peak Players per Hour on Steam via GitHyp
Total War: Warhammer’s Peak Players per Hour on Steam via GitHyp
Based on the reviews alone, Total War: Warhammer II has been considered the developers’ best work yet. But putting scores aside and focusing on player counts, it seems like Creative Assembly and Sega might have chosen to release the sequel a bit too soon.
Releasing the follow up a little over a year after the last title is clearly an effort by the devs and publisher to strike while the iron is hot and before the original’s player base drops to under 10k players an hour on the weekends. A move that would seem like the right sales call with the sequel’s strong #4 debut being a clear sign that fans still want more Total War.
Yet, the drop-off in players is also a sign that many have already had their Total War fix and the successful launches of similar turn-based games recently such as Divinity: Original Sin II have also taken a large chunk of previous players.