Steam's Top Genres by Revenue Hit Rate
A new analysis estimates Steam game revenues, ranking genres by their 'hit rate' of games earning over $100k. Sandbox and FPS genres lead, while 2D platformers and hidden object games are the riskiest.
A new revenue report estimates which Steam genres are most likely to produce a financial hit. The analysis by Ichiro Lambe, Matt Martindale, and Dr. Tim Ermilov on weloveit.io uses a review-based method to project earnings for over 100,000 Steam games.
The trio's model, known as the Boxleiter method, multiplies a game's user review count by 35 to estimate unit sales. While not exact, the technique is used by industry analysts. The data reveals stark contrasts, from Baldur's Gate 3's estimated $1.8 billion since 2020 to the physics climber Free Solo's estimated $34.
Genre Economics on Steam
The report's "genre economics" section ranks tags by their "hit rate," the percentage of games with that tag that have earned over $100,000. A game only counts toward a genre if the tag is among its six most popular user tags.
Sandbox games have the highest hit rate on Steam at 27.3%. The tag covers wildly different successful games like Terraria, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Project Zomboid. First-person shooters (FPS) follow with a 21.6% hit rate, though the tag is applied broadly to games like Portal 2 that aren't purely about shooting.
Here are the top 10 genres on Steam by hit rate according to the weloveit.io report:
| Genre | Hit Rate |
|---|---|
| Sandbox | 27.3% |
| FPS | 21.6% |
| Visual Novel | 19.1% |
| Sports | 18.7% |
| RPG | 17.8% |
| Adventure | 17.6% |
| Simulation | 16.5% |
| Strategy | 15.8% |
| Action | 14.8% |
| Puzzle | 9.5% |
Visual novels rank surprisingly high, aided by their ubiquity on the platform. Sports games benefit from a smaller pool of titles compared to a broad tag like "puzzle."
The lowest-ranking tags are more telling. Hidden object games have a 5.4% hit rate, while 2D platformers sit at 5.5%. Developing in these genres is risky, though they may be cheaper to produce. The full study notes 2D platformers have dropped in popularity since 2016, while visual novels have held steady since 2014.
Top Sellers and New Releases
For the week ending August 30, the revenue chart was led by successful launches. Mortal Shell 2 had a strong debut, though it was likely outperformed by How to Fish, a violent physics-based fishing simulator for 1-4 players. The Wardogs beta boosted interest ahead of its full release next month, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 reappeared on the list after a major 2.0 update and a steep discount.
Star Wars Zero Company, released on August 28, placed 12th; its full launch impact will show next week. The weekly deep cuts included Iron Blight, a gritty Eastern European FPS compared to No More Room in Hell, and the short horror game Can I Come In?, set in Soviet-era tower blocks. New metroidvanias Aggelos 2 and Divinum also released, the latter featuring hack 'n' slash combat. The source for this data is PC Gamer's weekly Steam review.
