Overview:
Game Room was released on an ususpecting public on March 24, 2010 on both the Xbox 360 and Games for Windows Live (PC) platforms. Game Room had a tumultuous year with a strong start, then a month delay in the weekly content releases. Things seemed to stabilize for several game packs until the developer, Krome, ran into some issues and decided to undergo downsizing and restructuring. After the last two or three packs were hastily released in late December, there has been an air of doubt about Game Room's future. Game Room is slated to launch for Windows Phone 7 in the immediate future with 5 games, but the launch date has yet to be confirmed.
i decided to post this a day early, since i have already done my Tuesday leaderboard check (only one game, Dodge 'em had an observable increase this week - the least ever. New content would be awesome).
Releases:
Game Room releases were accomplished through game packs that had embedded time codes to unlock the next week's content. The game launched with game pack 001 and 002 on March, 24, 2010 which both contained 15 games (for a total of 30 games). These games were released on Wednesdays. In all, 13 game packs were released to date. There were 188 games released in total (with a mystery game, Sunset Riders in the description but not yet released). Of these titles, 108 of them were ranked (3 medals) the other 80 games were time spender only games.
Sales:
Apparently, i am interested in approximating Game Room sales. i have been taking note of available data since Game Room dynamic leaderboards were instituted in late August. The quality of the data is somewhat subject as there are periods of incomplete data and misaligned data gathering dates (i am missing a week from when my Xbox 360 S was sent in for repair). i only have access to the data that the leaderboards provide: ranked games only and a plateau leaderboard system (which "hides" sales).
The success of Game Room depends on your expectations. i expected a $2.5-4.5 million dollar budget spread over three years (with much of the expense occurring before launch). i think (and i'm probably wrong) that Game Room would need to achieve annual sales of between $1-1.5 million dollars to be considered a success. That number would probably be lower if you factor out the time zero (sunk) cost.
i don't know if i can embed charts here, but here is what i would like to show... ranked game sales by: publisher, arcade/console, game pack and maybe a bar chart of weekly observable leaderboard increases. Sorry, this is not exactly formatted how i would like. Game Room Sales Distribution chart is based off of leaderboard level, the other charts are based off of estimated sales of ranked games only. i might restate the link to my Office online spreadsheet too, so you can get an idea of individual sales estimates (and maybe a bonus irr method estimates).
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AmQylLb0REoBdFJzSnNJeThVMHJocU0tMlNiVHU3dHc&hl=en
Legal-ish:
i am not in any way affiliated with MSFT, Krome or Game Room - other than purchasing all 108 ranked games and playing numerous hours. i am just doing this for "fun". All of my estimates should not be taken as actual numbers, they are just my best "educated guesses", use them at your own peril. Any trademarks, logos, service marks, etc are owned by the respective rights holders.
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