Death Stranding has sold over 10M copies

[Yurinka]

The 5M figure from March 2021 already accounts for both PS4 and PC sales up to that point, so a good chunk of the lifetime PC sales (north of 2M, y'all are right on that) is already included in that initially reported figure. Considering the very frontloaded commercial performance of Death Stranding, as well as the fact that the PC version had already been through a couple of Steam's seasonal sales up to that point, then I think it wouldn't be crazy to state that a majority of the PC sales happened before April of last year.

As we all know from looking at the various sales charts from all around the world, the full game release of the Director's Cut didn't do big numbers at all, barely moving the needle when it comes to new units sold. On the other hand, the $10 upgrade path for existing owners was relatively successful and popular, but I doubt those would count as actual sales.

So that's why I believe that a figure in the ballpark of 6M, or 6.5M being generous, would be more accurate.

The OVER 5 million copies was mentioned in March 2021. It was released in November 2019, so this covers maximum a year and 4 months. Doesn't include an extra year and 8 months of sales on these platforms (price cutted in PS), doesn't include any Directors Cut sales -was released months before that- and doesn't include any rare spare sale generated by extra exposure in PS and GP.

We know that DC on Steam did 200-400K (so something else more in the other PC stores) and that this type of console exclusive AAA games typically sell way better on console. So on top of that the extra sales from the base game PC and specially PS match pretty well an extra 2M-2.5M copies on top of the 5M.

Directors cut was like a 10$ upgrade wasn’t it?

Yes, but it was also sold as standalone game.

 

[Perrott]

The OVER 5 million copies was mentioned in March 2021. It was released in November 2019, so this covers maximum a year and 4 months. Doesn't include an extra year and 8 months of sales on these platforms (price cutted in PS), doesn't include any Directors Cut sales -was released months before that- and doesn't include any rare spare sale generated by extra exposure in PS and GP.

So another couple of million copies on top of that two wouldn't be rare at all.

As I said, all the data at our disposal has shown how Death Stranding has been very frontloaded at first sales-wise but with not as good legs as other PlayStation exclusives, so the 5M units reported back in March 2021 already accounted for the majority of the game's lifetime sales on both PS4 and PC.

Combined sales of Death Stranding on PS4 and the full game release of the Director's Cut on PS5 (not the $10 upgrade) in Japan amounted to just ~15k in all of 2021 (second year since its initial launch). This is clearly not the kind of game that moves several million units long after release.

 

[ethomaz]

As I said, all the data at our disposal has shown how Death Stranding has been very frontloaded at first sales-wise but with not as good legs as other PlayStation exclusives, so the 5M units reported back in March 2021 already accounted for the majority of the game's lifetime sales on both PS4 and PC.

Combined sales of Death Stranding on PS4 and the full game release of the Director's Cut on PS5 (not the $10 upgrade) in Japan amounted to just ~15k in all of 2021 (second year since its initial launch). This is clearly not the kind of game that moves several million units long after release.

In May 2021 PC sales were < 1 million.
So from these 5 million in March 2021 PS sales were > 4 million.

The data shows PC sales were not front loaded.

 

[Yurinka]

As I said, all the data at our disposal has shown how Death Stranding has been very frontloaded at first sales-wise but with not as good legs as other PlayStation exclusives, so the 5M units reported back in March 2021 already accounted for the majority of the game's lifetime sales on both PS4 and PC.

Combined sales of Death Stranding on PS4 and the full game release of the Director's Cut on PS5 (not the $10 upgrade) in Japan amounted to just ~15k in all of 2021 (second year since its initial launch). This is clearly not the kind of game that moves several million units long after release.

All the data at our disposal said that it sold 5M until March of last year, during sell time that happened since March last year and that since them they released the Director's Cut and that after including it on GP and PS Plus it now has 10M players.

Japan retail sales is a too small market, don't mean a shit when compared to global retail+digital sales. Specially if you only count the top from Famitsu, that are only a few dozen games per week when there are thousands of different games being sold and when digital is way bigger than retail for AAA games, particularly on the platform where they sell more: PlayStation.