Polish studio People Can Fly has published a financial report for 2021, in which they talked about the success of the Outriders shooter. As it turned out, the development of the game did not pay off during this period, and royalties from Square Enix were not received.

Image Source: Square Enix

Under the terms of the agreement, the publisher agreed to pay royalties only after reimbursement of its costs for the development, distribution and advertising support of Outriders. At the end of the reporting period, sales of a game released on April 1, 2021 did not generate sufficient revenue to meet this condition. Moreover, the leaders of People Can Fly are not sure that the shooter will ever pay off and the company will receive the due deductions.

Square Enix does not disclose sales data for Outriders – this information is not shared even with its creators. Last August, studio CEO Sebastian Wojciechowski suggested that 2-3 million copies had been sold by then.

“People Can Fly Group has received no royalties as of December 31, 2021, which means that Outriders’ sales proceeds to that date were insufficient to recover the costs incurred by the publisher to develop, distribute and promote the game,” the report says.

Last May, Square Enix reported that Outriders had attracted more than 3.5 million users in its first month. The company also claimed “the highest level of engagement in the cooperative mode” and noted that it was “immensely inspired” by the success of the project. Probably, a significant part of the players got access to the shooter through the Xbox Game Pass, where the console versions appeared simultaneously with the release. Later, Square Enix President Yosuke Matsuda said that subscriptions were able to attract more gamers than expected.

In the first weeks after the release, users complained about a large number of technical problems. Many of them are still unresolved, with players reporting server instability and poor performance. On Steam, the shooter has “mixed” reviews (rating – 65%, the total number of reviews – 42 thousand). The average score on Metacritic is 72–73/100.

The report also states that People Can Fly is working on five games, including two big-budget titles for well-known publishers, Project Gemini (Square Enix) and action role-playing Project Dagger with innovative gameplay and story solutions (Take-Two Interactive). Both are scheduled to be released no earlier than 2024.

Earlier this week, Square Enix announced that it would be selling some of its Western studios and franchises to the Embracer Group. The rights to Outriders (they are wholly owned by the publisher – including DLC, sequels and non-game products) were not included in the deal.

Outriders is out on PC (Steam, Epic Games Store ), PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, S, and Google Stadia. On June 30, the shooter will receive its first major addition – The Wordslayer.