2024 was a big year for video games and we saw a lot of games come out that surprised people; but not many of them were triple-A blockbusters. Why is that?

Some Disappointing Triple-A Launches

Suicide Squad Kills The Justice League

It’s safe to say that some video games failed to launch and find an audience. Many of the triple-A games failed to find an audience. Suicide Squad Kills The Justice League and Concord all fell flat on release. With Concord being pulled from stores and having its servers killed very quickly. Suicide Squad Kills The Justice League had a bit more shelf life; but even that will have its last update later this month. Both games come from established publishers; and in the case of Suicide Squad Kills The Justice League, the game had an established IP.

Skull & Bones is another video game that had some reasonable hype, but even that game had a very muted launch. That combined with XDefiant‘s underwhelming launch; and the buggy launch of Star Wars Outlaws, led to a very poor sales year for Ubisoft.

Then there are video games like Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024. Which was supposed to really be a victory lap as the last title did well. In spite of this, no one really took to the game after a bug-ridden launch.

There were also video games that frankly reviewed well but didn’t land with audiences. Dragon Age: The Veilguard had a good set of review scores; but just managed to not connect with audiences as was indicative of the sales numbers. Likewise, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth had great reviews but had very low sales. These games all failed to connect with audiences despite triple-A marketing budgets.

Where Indie Video Games Picked Up The Slack

Smaller games really took the charge in 2024.

Helldivers 2 obviously became a huge hit this year. The game comes from Arrowhead Game Studios, a small independent studio out of Sweden. Despite being a small indie team, the game has gone on to massive sales, great reviews, and huge success for Arrowhead Game Studios.

Hades II is in early access but already has got fans abuzz for the full release and has seen some healthy sales. The game’s developer is a small independent studio, Supergiant Games.

Even games like Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown showed studios that you don’t need a huge budget, just people dedicated to making a great game.

A lot of gamers flocked to critically acclaimed indie titles this past year. Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor, Mullet Madjack, UFO 50, Enshrouded, and Animal Well are just some of the examples of games that garnered attention for all the right reasons and saw significant love and attention from gamers for their gameplay and unique visual styles. They maybe didn’t sell as well as Hades II or Helldivers 2 but they certainly built loyal fanbases.

What Does This All Mean?

Moreso than previous years, this past year showed that gamers are weary of putting down money for a full-priced game if they don’t see the full value. Where big publishers have failed is expecting that if you make it, games will come.

Nowadays, gamers are more value-driven than ever before. $20 for a smaller indie game you’re going to spend 25+ hours on is more valuable than a full-priced game that offers you an incomplete experience, or one that you’re not sure you want to take.

While it was a weird year in that we saw many games that we expected to be up for Game Of The Year consideration fall short of expectations; but was great in that we saw many smaller, more passionate teams get their games in that same consideration. Hopefully, it shows publishers that they need to be more mindful of what they put out, and not to expect gamers to flock to a game if it’s not worth their hard-earned money.

Meanwhile, for all things Video Games, keep it tuned to That Hashtag Show.