Indie games old and new KILLED IT on Steam last week, while 4 new launches hit our top 10
Plus, we chatted to the developer of Mage Arena, a new viral indie game that has players casting spells with their voices. They told us it was inspired by a copypasta Tumblr meme.
Week 30 (July 20 to 27) was another eventful one on Steam, once again proving that the games industry is not doomed. Don’t listen to those doomsayers on LinkedIn!
Doomsayers:👎👿
DoomSLAYERS: 👍😈
Let’s have a PEAK peek at Steam’s week 30 top 10 (copies sold).
PEAK just won’t stop selling
PEAK was again the top Steam game by copies sold last week, selling another 671 K copies (revenues of $4.3 million). In total, the indie climbing sensation has sold 6.8 million copies and generated revenues of over $40 million.
Our data shows that 75% of PEAK’s players have played the title for less than 10 hours (46% less than 5 hours). But the game’s $7.99 price point means that’s still plenty of entertainment time per dollar spent – more than most other mediums.
While PEAK’s copies sold are starting to slow down, this one will go down in the books as another co-op indie hit. And it won’t be the last.
Fellow indie phenomenon R.E.P.O (#3), also a co-op game, but a horror one, sold another 149 K copies last week. R.E.P.O has sold 16.3 million copies in total ($127.7 million in revenues!)
Despite launching back in February, over half of R.E.P.O’s players have played it for less than 10 hours, which you can see in the bottom chart in this Alinea Platform screenshot:
Like PEAK, R.E.P.O’s low $9.99 price point makes it nonetheless worth it for most players, as evident from its overwhelmingly positive 96% user critic score.
You can also see in the screenshot above that R.E.P.O is resonating in price-sensitive markets like Russia (9% of its audience) and Brazil (6%). The same goes for PEAK.
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WUCHANG sold decently despite a rocky launch
Coming in at #2 with 442 K copies sold last week is WUCHANG: Fallen Feathers, a souls-like developed by Chinese studio Leenzee and published by Digital Bros.
WUCHANG (#2) has sold respectably for a new studio working on a big AAA-level title, with over 600 K copies sold on Steam overall and another 240 K on PlayStation. WUCHANG has generated around $40 million across these two platforms. It’s also available on Game Pass.
However, as we discussed in last Thursday’s newsletter, WUCHANG has been review-bombed on Steam, owing to performance issues and extremely poor optimization on PC (as well as some other factors we’ll discuss in a bit).
Performance on console and on the highest-end PCs has been far better, which is why the critical response to the game is far better than the user response. Many outlets reviewed the console version, and most reviewers have high-end PCs. IGN and GameSpot gave WUCHANG 8/10 scores.
We also discussed last week that China-based players have been even more negative towards WUCHANG versus other countries. In general, gamers in China tend to use Steam reviews as a forum to discuss their frustration (due to other forums being hard to access in China .
What’s more, some players in China were unhappy with the game’s portrayal of events during the Ming Dynasty. The backlash in China is a significant hit to WUCHANG’s launch, as over two-thirds of its audience is Chinese.
Our testing found that a new patch for the game fixed some issues (but added some others), so WUCHANG still has some work to do to win over its core audience more.
On that note, China is an extremely popular market for Steam across most AA(A) titles these days. As you can see below, China accounts for a significant share of players across some of 2025’s biggest Steam launches:
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Our testing found that a new patch for WUCHANG fixed some issues (but added some others), so the game still has some work to do to win back its core audience.
Discourse around WUCHANG being an abject failure is overstated, as it is selling way faster than many other non-FromSoftware souls-likes on Steam (launch aligned), including Lies of P and Nioh 2.
Two new games rounded off the top 5
The King Is Watching (#4) – a roguelite kingdom builder developed by Hypnohead and published by tinyBuild, launched on 21 July. It sold 139 K copies last week and 158 K overall. That’s revenue of over $1.7 million.
The King Is Watching’s core gameplay loop is resonating with players, but the lack of mid-run saves has been a sticking point for some. Luckily, Hypnohead is hard at work on a fix.
The developers’ decision to localize in simplified Chinese has also paid dividends, as 51% of its audience comes from China. The Steam Next Fest demo also paid off, as 10% of those who played the King Is Watching demo have already been to full-game buyers.
Co-op horror shooter Killing Floor 3 sold 130 K copies last week, making it the #5 game on Steam for copies sold last week. It’s now sold 197 K on the platform (revenues of $6.7 million). While this is a solid start, Killing Floor 3 has had mixed reviews from users and critics. The PS5 version has sold fewer than 100 K copies.
While the core gunplay and visuals have been praised, many fans found Killing Floor 3’s feature set lacklustre compared to the 2016 previous title (and all its refinements). It’s a similar story to 2023’s Payday 3.
An early-access label might have tempered players’ expectations. Hopefully, there’s time for Tripwire to build on Killing Floor 3’s solid foundation and win back disgruntled fans (and convert on-the-fence ones). After all, just 2% of Steam players who played Killing Floor 2 have played its new sequel.
But the jury’s still out.
Mage Arena’s unique feature helped it break through the noise (and was inspired by a meme)
Lo-fi PvP game Mage Arena (#6) – made by one-person dev jrsjams, launched in early-access on July 24 and sold 119 K copies last week, making it last week #6 game by copies sold.
It’s starting to blow up.
Mage Arena sold another 116 K copies yesterday (Jul 28) alone, bringing its grand total to 235 K copies sold. Mage Arena has generated revenues of $286 K so far, owing to its low price point of $2.99. The price will increase to $4.99 once the developer has ironed out some of the bugs.
Mage Arena’s unique mechanic is player voice-activated spells. For example, shouting ‘’fireball’’ into the mic casts a fireball. It’s been a hit among players and has gone viral on socials.
Mage Arena has managed to break through the discoverability noise in no small part due to some viral clips on TikTok (like this one and this one). And it’s already been streamed by xQc, so Mage Arena has the potential to blow up even more by the time it hits 1.0.
We spoke to the developer, jrsjams, about the Mage Arena’s success. ‘’The reception has been better than I could have ever hoped,’’ said the dev. ‘’The craziest part to me is that people seem to like it so much they are willing to overlook all of the many game-breaking bugs.’’
Clearly, gameplay and fun trump everything else (take note, AAA). And Mage Arena is resonating with its players, with an overwhelmingly positive review score.
When we asked jrsjams where he got the idea for the voice-controlled spells, they said they were inspired by this copypasta Tumblr meme:
The 1.0 launch is planned to happen somewhere within the next six months, so it’s one to watch. Mage Arena’s main market right now is the US (46% of players), but its low price and system requirements mean it has high potential in price sensitive markets too (its #2 country is Poland, followed by Russia).
Discounts and a 1.0 launch round off the top 10
As for the rest of the list:
Stardew Valley (#7) sold 98 K copies last week, down from around 106 K the week before. Despite being over nine years old, the indie farming sim sold this many copies at its full $14.99 price point. It sold 277 K in week 28, when it was half price. But hundreds of thousands of Steam players are willing to buy Stardew every month whether its on discount or not.
Red Dead Redemption 2 (#8) generated Steam revenues of $2.3 million via another 75 K copies sold last week, thanks to its discount from $60 to $15, which ran from June 26 to July 23. Needless to say, it will certainly appear in our full July ranking next week. It’s sold over 75 million copies across platforms to date and is one of the best selling and highest-grossing premium games of all time.
Undertale (#9) shifted 74 K copies in week 30, thanks to its steep discount to $2 (from $10). On Steam, over 13% of Undertale players have Hollow Knight: Silk Song wishlisted. It’s their top-wishlisted game. Needless to say, we can expect big things when Silksong hopefully launches later this year (fool me once …)
Finally, Abiotic Factor rounds out the top 10 with 70 K copies sold. Abiotic Factor is very Half-Life coded, rewarding exploration and lateral thinking.
After about 1.5 years of early access, the survival-crafting game finally hit 1.0 on July 22. Prior to its early-access period, Abiotic factor had already sold 1.5 million copies. Our pricing data shows that it’s price bounced between $20 and $25 during its early-access period.
As 1.0 sales have been relatively modest, publisher Playstack is testing the pricing waters, having already discounted the 1.0 version from $35 to $28.
That said, Abiotic Factor’s 1.0 launch brought back early-access players in droves. As you can see in the Alinea Platform screenshot below, Abiotic Factor has been enjoying its highest Steam DAU numbers to date (129 K on July 27, beating its previous peak of 110 K during its launch week):
Abiotic Factor also launched on console last week to coincide with its 1.0 launch, also available via PlayStation Plus (Extra and Premium) and Xbox Game Pass.
I checked out the game last night via PS Plus, and it’s incredibly fun. Over 100 K PS5 players have also played Abiotic Factor via PS Plus so far.
That’s right! We have PlayStation Plus data in our platform, so you can check splits between copies sold and PS Plus players. See for yourself: reach out for your free platform trial here.
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