The biggest Steam launch of the year remains Black Myth: Wukong. The second biggest Steam launch of the year remains Palworld, which hit 2.4 million and 2.1 million concurrent players at their peak. This number has only ever been outdone by one game PUBG, which peaked at 3.2 million.
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The third biggest Steam launch of the year, excluding free-to-play gimmick game Banana, has ben Helldivers 2, thanks to its peak of 458,000 concurrent Steam players. It has been outed from this position though by a new RPG.
For those that have not been paying attention this RPG — tracking slightly better than fellow new release Marvel Rivals, which is doing crazy numbers itself — is Path of Exile 2, which isn’t even fully out yet, only in Early Access.
Those interested in checking out Path of Exile 2 — which hit 459,000 concurrent users today — it is currently $29.99 in Early Access form. And according to its “Mostly Positive” rating on Steam, it is great, but there are some issues, namely error screens, some performance problems, and some design flaws, all of which is to be expected in an early access release.
“Path of Exile 2 is a next generation free-to-play Action RPG from Grinding Gear Games, featuring co-op for up to six players,” reads an official description for the game for those unfamiliar with it. “Path of Exile 2 takes place in the land of Wraeclast, a dark continent populated by unique cultures, ancient secrets, and monstrous dangers. A sinister threat, long thought destroyed, has begun creeping back on the edge of civilization, driving people mad and sickening the land with Corruption.”
Obviously, Path of Exile 2, and its predecessor, wear their Diablo inspiration on their sleeve, but it appears it has surpassed the series that inspired it. Where Diablo 4 only managed a concurrent peak on Steam of 55,000, Path of Exile 2 managed 8x this and could hit a bigger peak this weekend.
While the success of Path of Exile 2 may come as a surprise to some, it shouldn’t come as much surprise to those paying attention. The genre is obviously big on Steam, and the first game was a bonafide sleeper hit and grown with terrific post-launch support from Grinding Gear Games, who no doubt also built considerable anticipation for the sequel by making fans wait 11 years from the first game.
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