It appears that 2023 was a very good year for PC gaming in particular, even if gaming in general was huge in 2023. With an 18% year-over-year gain in 2022, the worldwide PC gaming industry reached $9 billion in 2023, according to a forecast by VG Insights, which estimates sales with a reasonably high degree of accuracy using data from Steam and other sources. After a few years of gradual but steady expansion, this occurred.
When comparing individual games, Baldur’s Gate 3 easily led the pack in terms of sales volume and earnings, with Hogwarts Legacy coming in second. The breakout indie co-op horror game Lethal Company came in third place in terms of copies sold, while Starfield came in third place in terms of income made. Looking at the top lists, you’ll see that single-player games mostly role-playing games, and simple multiplayer games are frequently highlighted. Since the popularity of live service and microtransaction-supported games appears to be declining, there aren’t many of those kinds of games on the lists.
The list of the top 10 new releases on Steam in terms of units sold in 2023 is also included in the report. It’s still the same top two games: Hogwarts Legacy comes in second and Baldur’s Gate 3 takes first. After Overwatch 2, which ranked fourth, Lethal Company secured the third position based on units sold. Places five and six were taken by Sons of the Forest, sixth by Starfield, and seventh by BattleBit Remastered. The remake of Resident Evil 4 came in eighth place, The Finals in ninth place, and Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon rounds out the top 10.
Only two free-to-play games and five cooperative/multiplayer games are among the top 10 games by units, with seven of the ten titles making an appearance on both lists. When it comes to total game income, games without microtransactions rule the top releases. Small independent teams consisting of no more than 16 people created four of the games that made the lists. In 2023, new releases on Steam brought in a total of $9 billion in sales, twice that of 2019. Additionally, 580 million games were sold overall.
Here are the top 10 highest-grossing new releases in 2023 on Steam:
- Baldur’s Gate 3 – $657 million
- Hogwarts Legacy – $341 million
- Starfield – $235 million
- Resident Evil 4 – $159 million
- Sons of the Forest – $116 million
- Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon – $87 million
- EA Sports FC 24 – $81 million
- Star Wars Jedi: Survivor – $68 million
- Lethal Company – $52 million
- Cities: Skylines II – $50 million
Here are the top 10 best-selling new releases in 2023 on Steam
- Baldur’s Gate 3
- Hogwarts Legacy
- Lethal Company
- Overwatch 2
- Sons Of The Forest
- Starfield
- BattleBit Remastered
- Resident Evil 4
- The Finals
- Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon
It is a rather large sum for Starfield, given that the game’s availability on Game Pass must have cannibalized a significant share of sales. Although there were around 14,000 games launched on Steam overall in 2023, the market is becoming more and more of a “winners take all” scenario, with the top 10 Steam titles accounting for 61 percent of total platform income. Nevertheless, according to VG Insights, over 930 Steam games brought in more over $1 million in sales in 2023.
