UK Sales Charts: 92% of Sniper Elite 5 Sales Are on PS5, PS4

This game deserves it - it is such an excellent game. Really am enjoying it

Proof that quality is as niche as VR. People just aren't interested.

Nice one. Awesome game

Really happy to see Gran Turismo 7 move up from 10th to 5th place this week. GT7 is my game of the year so far, and I hope more people get to experience the game despite the negative press it initially attracted.

Hardly a shock that it's sells best on Playstation with it being on Gamepass

You should mention that SE5 accounts 92 percent of its sales on PlayStation and only 8 percent on Xbox also because it’s on Game Pass.

Hmmm what happened to Elden Ring?

It would be a nice comparison between how much money these developers make selling their games on playstation and how much they grab upfront from gamepass..My guess is that their sales on xbox ecosystem was always lukewarm at best so gamepass is a better deal for them..

@The_Pixel_King same, being always online is just stupid but it really is a fantastic game and the best I've played this year so far

Happy to see that the ps5 is getting consistent stock

@CynicalGamer Everyone already owns it.

Nice. I’ll probably get a used copy of SE5 at some point. I liked 3 but really couldn’t get into 4. Not sure why.

Was always going to 'sell' best on PS hardware as Xbox gamers can play the entire game as part of Game Pass -they don't 'need' to pay the upfront asking price anytime soon...

That's like bragging you are selling more coffee than Starbucks but Starbucks are giving away their Coffee for 'free' so not selling any coffee...

@WallyWest not even close to true it’s isn’t gta 5 lol

@BAMozzy what's the excuse for every other game then?

@JJ2 what that’s crazy since 4 is like infinitely better than 3 which I really like it was the first SE I ever played and is how I became a fan but 4 just smokes it. 5 is great and easily the best one yet

@BAMozzy who cares lol it’s not that serious

@dark_knightmare2
Ha good to hear. Yes I don’t know why. I still have the cool comic book that was with SE3 launch. Really nice to keep.

Good to see both HFW and GT 7 still going strong. They deserve it too, both are fantastic titles.

@WallyWest Fair point. Myself included. I'm guessing new ps5 owners are why Horizon and GT is remaining this high.

Edit: So it might just be that Horizon and GT5 have longer legs then if these two continue to sell well. Many people were probably waiting for ps5s before getting these games.

Bought Sniper Elite 4 on PS4, this one’s on Game Pass so got it from there.

Was hoping my copy of Sniper Elite 5 would arrive today alongside my PS4 & PS5 copy of Kao the Kangaroo, sadly only Kao the Kangaroo arrived, granted I wouldn't be playing Kao or Sniper Elite 5 until I've finished Ghostwire Tokyo, Dishonored, Concrete Genie, Jak X, Final Fantasy XII & Final Fantasy VII Remake (PS5).

Happy to see Horizon still having great legs. It’s worth every penny.

It's free on gamepass, so that's why most of the sales are on PS5 and PS4.

@Nexozi yeah but even if it wasn’t it would have still sold more on ps5 just not this ratio

@BAMozzy 92% though. Assuming the game sold 500k during launch that amounts to 27.6 Million at a £60 price tag (not even accounting for the PS5 tax).

There’s no way MS paid even close to that to get it on gamepass.

This just proves that pretty much the majority of xbox owners bought their consoles just for gamepass, once all those interested in gamepass own a series S/X we will see sales drop off drastically for those consoles

@BAMozzy The brag might be something like, every one of those sales will generate profit for SE5, irrespective of how much the player will participate in the experience. Once an IP gains enough rep, never put it on gamepass again. Which will also sell even less again on Xbox. Best money to be made, don't bother with Xbox at all after game is sufficient quality and reputation.

@Fight_Teza_Fight And PLUS the trend is still in favour of digital. Whatever sales digital Xbox versions had, they still won't be redressing the balance because ps players also buy huge amounts of digital version.

@themightyant That's true. Gamepass and Xbox in general might be good to build up word, but the meat lies elsewhere. I don't mind Xbox users litmus testing our games 🙈

@KayOL77 Basically devs put their games on gamepass due to the poor xbox one sales, they know they can make more money from the one off payment Microsoft give them over actual sales on those xbox consoles, whilst on playstation which has over 110 million ps4 sales alone, they know their games will sell really well and don't want their games on playstations subscription services.

If xbox series S/X sell 100 million consoles there's no way devs would want their games on gamepass, they would rather sell copies to that enormous fan base.

Since game is on Game Pass and this report is only for physical copies (Xbox has way higher digital ratio then PlayStation) it is hardly that surprising....
It would be more interesting when digital data will come later this week.

Can't wait to see the MS investors notice that their own games are making them more money on PlayStation. That should generate an interesting 'tussle'.

@UltimateOtaku91 last time I recall a statistic like this was Elden Ring and as soon as the digital sales came into account, the game sold proportional to install base across Xbox/PS5. So no, Xbox users don’t just buy their consoles for GamePass, but Xbox users are way more likely to go digital.

When Bandai releases numbers they showed that 85% of sales on Xbox were digital. All these UK physical only chart show us is that PS users still like disks.

@Tharsman But Elden Ring wasn't on gamepass whereas this game is, so even when they do announce the digital sales it should still be higher on playstation

Unless they count gamepass users towards digital sales (which I doubt)

@Bismarck Because people are interested in having fun, not video game snobbery.

@UltimateOtaku91 but you said the majority of people only buy Xbox for GamePass, if there was true Elden Ring would had not sold well at all on Xbox. It actually sold 29% of its copies on Xbox, compared to 32% on PS5 (rest on PC), an almost even distribution.

Remember when these Xbox executives claimed Game Pass would boost game sales? Aged as poorly as the sales on Xbox consoles. Lol.
Subscription models gonna kill gaming.

and like stated in the article no digital sales date included and as over 50% of game sales now days are digital you are missing at least half the data to draw any sort of conclusion from this data would be misleading

why do they provide physical only sales data its pretty pointless in todays gaming market

Xbox wants its users to buy digital and incentivises them to do so Microsoft rewards gives you credit to use on the store and gamepass gives you 20% off games. let alone game sharing

Will say what others are saying of course it sells best on ps5/4 as it's on gamepass , it's just getting old and stinks of fanboyism.

But hey you have to get those clicks! This article stinks of elitism.

If things where reversed this article would the complete opposite as would some of the posts , gamers are thier double standards. Articles like these just promote fanboyism sites like this should be above this and it's just not PlayStation all fanboys are just as bad as each .

One minute people moan about paying £70 or even 40 for a game and next moan about gamepass and next breath want Sony exclusives day one on PlayStation plus!

People should just enjoy each console for what they offer and not get so worked up!

@Fight_Teza_Fight Difficult to know how much of that price actually reaches the Devs or Publisher. Sales on Sony's platform benefit Sony a LOT - especially if they are Digital sales so they get their 30% retailer profit (£18 out of the £60) + they get money for every game sold on their Platform as a 'fee' for letting them publish on PS, and fees for any use of Trademarks (PS/Sony logo's) on any marketing or packaging, costs incurred in manufacturing and distribution of Physical media, etc. Then you have the investors that need to be paid back (inc interest), all the costs involved in both developing and marketing the game etc so may need to sell 3m+ to break even for the 3rd Party Publisher with how 'little' money they get from 'each' individual sale.

MS has many different options for the Publisher (or Developer) so its not known how MS has arranged to pay for its Game Pass release. It could be a 'fixed' fee - enough to cover all their Costs 'up front' so ANYTHING else they get is Profit - inc Sales on PS platforms. It could be a fee for everyone who tries it - rising in value the more time they spend playing the game. It could be a combination of an upfront fee and a 'fee' based on Player numbers.

Point is, you don't get £60 for every game sold as a Publisher/Developer. If the game sold 1m for example and 920k were bought on PS, they may get a LOT less money from those than say 50k sales on Xbox and say 10m+ playing via Game Pass - enough to be 'immediately' in profit. Chances are sales would of been less than 900k on Xbox in this scenario, so getting 50k sales and 10m gamers playing may well be more lucrative - especially long term when DLC, MTX etc releases. That is better for them than seeing the game sell well at launch and then drop away, never knowing if they will reach the thresh hold between success and commercial flop, not having a big 'user' base to sell extra content too...

Its difficult to know either way for certain which is 'better' for 3rd Party Publishers but the fact is that they are willing to sacrifice 'sales' at the point where Sales are [generally] at their highest (both in terms of Numbers and Price point as they sell 'most' in the first few weeks). If the Publishers thought it would be in their 'best' interest to only sell at launch, not offer any Subscription based access (they could still go the Subscription route at a later date - like GotG for example), they would take that option - it must be in their 'favour' to be willing to sacrifice Day 1 sales for Subscription based options.

Its easy to see why Elden Ring for example would not want to be on a Subscription service at launch - a game with a lot of Hype and no doubt 'pre-orders', a lot of positivity towards the game and therefore a chance to cash in 'big' in the first part of the games life-cycle. Whether they decide to go the Subscription route at a Later date to boost player count, reach more people to get them to become fans to buy the 'next' game etc or not, time will tell.

But all we can say for certain is that it must be in their 'favour' to sacrifice Day 1 sales in favour of Subscription based remuneration. Otherwise, they wouldn't accept those terms and have the 'choice' not to release on any Subscription service. Its still their 'choice' and therefore must be beneficial because if it wasn't, they would not of released on Game Pass - at least not Day 1.

@Col_McCafferty I'm not saying there is any 'Bias' here, its making a factual statement based off actual information but doesn't really tell the whole story.

Its like claiming to sell more Coffee than Starbucks when Starbucks are giving away Coffee that day to most of its customers.

Its a 'hollow' brag in the circumstances without context. Therefore I made the point that Xbox gamers aren't going to be 'buying' SE5 when they can play it as part of their Subscription fee. If Sony were to offer a multi-platform game day and date on PS+, then you'd expect that to sell 'better' initially on Xbox for the same reasons.

Context is everything - 92% of the sales could still only represent less than 5% of the gamers who are actually playing the game with over 10x the user base on Xbox platforms -the vast majority of which haven't purchased the game. Not saying that is the case, but the point is, 92% of 'physical' sales does not mean that the game has more players on Playstation at all - it just means that 92% of Physical sales were on PS because Xbox owners don't 'need' to buy it to play it. 25m+ can play it day and date without needing to purchase...

That's another 'fact'. That is not Fanboyism its a fact. Its not 'Bias' in favour of MS or Sony - its just the 'different' situation that Gamers on each Platform has. If you want to play SE5 on PS, you have to buy it - so therefore it stands to reason that PS only gamers will purchase. On Xbox, you have 2 choices, purchase or play via Subscription and with 25m+ GP Subscribers, chances are the majority will opt to play via Subscription - which obviously impacts Physical Sales.

Its Logical that 2 'relatively' even matched consoles in terms of sales would likely have similar combined 'sales' - Physical & Digital - although if there are 'incentives' to favour Digital over Physical on a platform, that would impact Physical sales - not the Combined sales but also may explain why 1 may seem to have higher Physical sales in charts. If one offers a Subscription service that impacts Day1 sales, then logically you expect the other to sell more - even if the sub based option has 10x the actual number of gamers playing, its still likely to have 'lower' sales figures because Gamers don't need to Purchase.

Its almost 'pointless' discussion. I doubt anyone expected Xbox to sell a similar number of Physical copies and doesn't really indicate anything. Its not even an indication of 'popularity', of user base because 25m+ can play without Purchasing so could easily have 10x more 'Xbox' gamers playing SE5 than PS gamers.

Bias comes from selectively picking 'facts' out and presenting them out of context to mislead or insinuate something more than it is. This article clearly states that a lot of Xbox users will be playing via Subscription so acknowledges the 'context' behind why 92% of sales were on PS. However, others in the Comments seem to have missed that and going off the 'headline' only - reading what they want to read into that so my comments were more to those than the articles author!

@BAMozzy Your posts are way too long to bother reading.

Sorry!

@suikoden No one wants Sony exclusives day on Plus. No one asks for that.

@Jaz007

I don't want too see them as well, but seen plenty begging for them on here. It's just as bad with gamepass you get those wanting every big triple a game on gamepass first day. Lots of people are just greedy and want everything for free.

There's such a huge sales disparity because no one buys games on Xbox anymore. They just wait and play whatever is offered on Gamepass. Third parties that aren't on GP, be very afraid. Microsoft is cultivating a consumer market that is only interested in what it can play for free in it's subscription. If you aren't able to get into Gamepass, may as well not release the game on the platform. It's a problem that Microsoft doesn't even realize it's digging itself into...no one is going to want to put their games on your platform is there won't be a market for it.

@CynicalGamer They sold 13 million copies already so it think it was a succes already.

@BAMozzy FFS make a less long response im certain you can make your point in way less words.

One big thing you missed that MS may get a unwelcome monopoly if you will make money on your game and they can leverage developers on how much money they want from them.

Digital only is a scary option which will only be great for big corp. A MS/Nintendo/Sony/Epic/Steam. Thats only good for corp not the customer.

@Flaming_Kaiser never said it wasn't. I like all three games I mentioned.

More importantly Who’s the 8% on Xbox/PC that payed full price for a game that’s on gamepass ??

92% sales on PlayStation to 8% on Xbox, exactly what Microsoft asked for.
insert surprised Pikachu face here

Im waiting for price drop, its on gamepass so no reason for me to buy full price

@KayOL77 don't think their investors mind one bit when game pass is generating constant revenue which keeps growing each quarter, and not forgetting gamepass subscribers spend 50% more in the Xbox store than none subscribers.

Yes I may get sniper elite 4 first on disk for ps5 as last one I played was elite 3 really enjoyed it but even gd while since played an elite game so I'll get 4 first go through that campaign then buy 5 ,great news it's doing well on first few days on sale, the invasion mode sds interesting and great that gt7 ,hzdfw doing well again for sales in line with more ps5 stock ,gt7 is my game of the year so far but I haven't played the other heavy hitters yet so all to play for

@BAMozzy As long as we're selectively choosing facts, remember also that SE5 is on gamepass and anybody thinking that sales are gonna be anywhere near ps sales for physical+digital is just kidding 🙈

@UltimateOtaku91 Gamepass is bundled with gold making it a better offer than ps plus or just gold by itself. I didn't buy for game pass i buy the console which offers me the best value at the time 360 over PS3, PS4 over Xbox one and now series x over PS5 and now backwards compatibility i refuse to give sony any money for ps now to play games are trash resolution with input delay and low fps

@Jaz007 I keep seeing stories that refute your claim one from three weeks ago on this site talks about deterioration in game quality if gave away on plus according to a sony higher up meaning someone has been begging for ps plus to have exclusives on it day one

The fact its on Gamepass is probably why.
Who'd buy it if its "free"?

Surprised Nintendo Switch Sports has such legs.
Another evergreen title from Nintendo, I suspect they'll get another next week too with Mario Strikers.

See I think you're failing to report on this holistically, what this actually shows imo, is not a market shift towards consuming games via subscription. Instead this exemplifies a clear split between strategy, demonstrating that those in the Xbox eco system are arguably going to stop purchasing games, what this does to the industry in the long term is questionable. But heres the important part I feel you missed; game sales of new releases are selling strongly on Playstations hardware, there is no change to buying behaviours here whatsoever. Therefore theres a clear arms race beginning; will developers see real lucrative benefits by lumping their game into GP day 1 or will a developer see more profit by selling the traditional way via PS hardware. Without seeing the intricacies of GP's payouts we can only hazard a guess. However if I was to place a bet I'd say more income would be netted on traditional software sales. Therefore it can go one of two ways imo; both strategies will exist in the future, as selling via both revenue streams day 1 is a win win for devs/publishers or less 3rd party games will release day 1 on GP, opting for a futher income boost at a later date post-release when traditional games sales have slowed down, again win win for devs/publishers. One of these is probably the future I envisage.

@Deityjester makes sense that you're here.

@BAMozzy All I’m talking about is revenue made BAM.
Sony & MS have different shareholders to adhere to. The problem is once both companies start playing the same game (subscriptions)- devs will have to make a choice; quality or quantity.

Why make a 150million dollar investment when you can do it for 30million as your not selling physical copies as it’s on a subscription service?

@Fight_Teza_Fight I guess that really depends on whether or not the Subscription service actually increases their revenue or not. The amount you 'can' realistically invest is surely dependent on the 'revenue' you have coming in and their are multiple ways these days of receiving revenue from your projects.

Sales themselves are not always guaranteed either so if you invest 150m that project still has to sell more than a 50m project to break even, let alone give them a pool of money to 'reinvest'.

Total sales revenue is not that important if you only see a small fraction of that. You need to know how much each sale is worth - and in most cases, the price the Consumer pays is a 'long' way from the price the Manufacturer/Publisher etc sells their products for 'wholesale'. As I said,its 30% mark-up for Digital sales, tax too is often added.

They may only get a small portion due to all the others that take their cut out of the price. For example, that £60 game on Sony's Store is instantly giving Sony a lot of money - take off the 20% Tax (£48), then take off Sony's 30% mark up as retailer (£33.60) add in all the costs involved in making and distributing, marketing costs etc - all of which needs to be 'covered' from the sales revenue. If it doesn't sell well enough, its going to impact how much they can 're-invest' into their next game.

Some games do sell well - easily surpassing expectations. However, others don't. Some devs/publishers may well actually benefit more by the Subscription model and their method of being paid. Anyone who thinks Sea of Thieves would of been a 'financial' success with Game Pass is mad. That would not of sold more than a few million and most would of dropped away due to small player base - but with over 25m players now, its a 'success' that's still being supported 5yrs later.

Its difficult to know what's the 'best' solution for Devs and/or Publishers and as Subscription services offer different type of payments, you'll never know the true story.

The way I see it, 3rd Party Publishers/Devs have that choice - its NOT compulsory to launch Day and Date into any Subscription service so if they are 'willing' to negotiate terms,they must be (at least projected to be) the most beneficial for them - otherwise why bother sacrificing sales for player count?

Also, lets say for example, SE5 sold 1m Physical copies and 1m Digital copies across both Consoles. Assuming 92% were on PS and with a 50:50 split, that's about 1.84m copies with only 160k on Xbox. Lets say those 2m also give the Publishers £15 per sale so 30m in actual revenue.

Now lets say Xbox had 15m who downloaded and played via Game Pass and they get £5 per person (rising if they go on to purchase) and most of those now go on to spend 20% more on MTX, DLC etc than those who bought the game - where is the largest revenue coming from? Game Pass Subscribers...

We know that some 'independent' studios are happy to receive ALL their development costs etc covered in full and a decent amount of money in the bank (before it releases) to start developing their 'next' game so anything more they get is 'bonus'. They can't even start their next project until they have sold enough to clear their debt and then give them money to develop their next title. That piece of mind is much better than releasing a game and no-one really noticing because its an 'indie'.

I do think its going to be a case by case basis - some games may well benefit more from Sales first and others by building up the Player Count first. With Sony investing in a lot of GaaS, I can see those coming to PS+ day and date in the 'near' future as they tend to benefit most by Player Count and if you haven't spent £60-70 on it, that player base may well be more willing to invest in all the 'extra' content that will be dropped out regularly.

Having 20m+ people sat in your 'digital' store (app/Game) is much more beneficial than a few million who have paid to get in that store because they are more willing to spend Money. Of course you still 'need' that same quality you'd expect from any other AAA game and if its 'not' up to scratch, those people won't want to spend their time in your game/store and therefore won't spend money.

If anything, it means that Subscription games have to be more than just some flashy looking, over hyped but ultimately average game-play/story etc games because they 'need' to keep you engaged so you will spend money on them. If you don't 'enjoy' the first hour or so, then you'll just delete the game and move on to whatever else is available. If you buy,then they already have your money so it doesn't really matter if you only play an hour.

In my opinion, Player Engagement is the 'key' to success for Subscription based games. You are putting out your project for anyone to 'play' in the hope that they'll like it enough to buy permanently, to invest money in extra content etc. Also know that if you don't engage the player, they will move on to all those other options available. Its not all about making the game 'look' awesome to convince buyers, it now has to be great to get the full potential from a Subscription service - and therefore it should put the emphasis on ensuring the game is as good as it can be before launch. And if you have a 'disaster' at launch, especially with Sales, you may get a 2nd chance with the Subscription audience at a later date when its 'fixed'.

Bad games are 'bad' games regardless of whether they are in a Subscription or Not but I don't see the Subscription model being 'detrimental' to the amount that can be reinvested into gaming. Bad games will fail on both models because people won't 'buy' or 'Download & Play' broken, poor games when they have so much choice and plenty of great games to play.

@Toypop Yeah that's a fair point.

@Deityjester That extends to more than Plus essential and doesn’t indicate anyone on this site. That’s a response to gamepass and similar services first and foremost.