Launch weekend has seen Baldur’s Gate 3 break into the top 10 all-time concurrent player counts on Steam with 712,281 players here on on August 5th, 2023 at once according to SteamDB. That huge peak puts it above Goose Goose Duck, taking the 9th most-played spot, and pushing Apex Legends and its 624k peak into the 11th spot. The “you must be this tall to ride” bar for the top 10 is now firmly fixed at a peak of over 700,000.
Don’t feel bad for poor Apex Legends, in the merely prestigious 11th spot, as the free to play battle royale shooter can wipe its tears upon a giant pile of money and a current player count that the concrete, bounded experience of Baldur’s Gate surely won’t consistently have a year from now.
Baldur’s Gate 3 surpassed 500,000 players yesterday and nearly reached 600k, so this Saturday peak puts it a strong hundred thousand people up from that peak. Probably because not all of us can just play all day on a weekday and/or take off work for a game launch.
If you think that this peak will be the last for Baldur’s Gate 3, that could well be wrong. Monster hit Elden Ring didn’t hit its 953k peak concurrent player count until the weekend after launch weekend—presumably after massive exposure and excited fans brought yet more people to the already-huge game launch.
That kind of word-of-mouth will be helped by the stories people are already telling about playing Baldur’s Gate 3. You’ve got D&D microceleb and voice actor Matthew Mercer building box towers to circumvent a wall. You’ve got reams of vital Forgotten Realms underpants lore. You’ve got a dedicated horny noises voice actor. You’ve got the TOS including your obligations under Eldritch Law.
It’s clear that things are just getting started for this 20-years-later entry into one of PC Gaming’s most storied series. Larian CEO Swen Vincke is certainly riding high on it, saying he’s got no intention of selling the company now that they’re probably one of the most successful independent developers in the world.
