Weekend Highlights (November 30 - December 1)

Fortnite set a new record for the number of concurrent viewers at an in-game concert, Garry's Mod has been purchased over 25.5 million times, and Marvel's Spider-Man may have earned $3.8 billion — here are the main events in the gaming industry from the past weekend.

Garry’s Mod

• On November 30, Fortnite concluded Chapter 5 with a virtual concert called Remix: The Finale featuring Snoop Dogg, Eminem, and other popular rappers. At its peak, over 14 million people were simultaneously in the game. According to Epic Games, this is a record for concerts in Fortnite. Previously, the most popular concert in the battle royale was Travis Scott's performance in April 2020, which was attended by 12.3 million concurrent Fortnite players. However, outside of concerts, Fortnite has had even higher online presence. In December 2020, during a massive battle with Galactus marking the end of another season, the number of concurrent users exceeded 15.3 million.
• Last week marked the 18th anniversary of the sandbox game Garry's Mod. In honor of the occasion, its creator Garry Newman announced that the game's sales have reached 25,560,290 copies. Newman recalls that the idea to sell Garry's Mod on Steam originally came from Valve; he himself thought that nobody would buy his creation. Now, he's glad he was wrong. Notably, three months ago, Garry's Mod entered the Guinness World Records as the best-selling PC-exclusive.
• Weekly sales of The Game Awards 2024 nominees significantly increased in Europe, reported journalist Christopher Dring from GamesIndustry, citing GSD data. He noted that, as of the last week, sales of Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth surged by 288%, Metaphor: ReFantazio by 172%, Astro Bot by 61%, the Silent Hill 2 remake by 43%, and Elden Ring by 38%. Dring explained that while the growth was linked to Black Friday sales, the nomination of these projects for awards played a significant role. The overall game sales in the European market grew by only 10%, but these titles generated extraordinary excitement, he explained.
• The revenue from the first part of Marvel's Spider-Man could have reached $3.8 billion with game sales of 20 million copies. This information is noted in the LinkedIn profile of former Sony Interactive Entertainment marketer Kevin Kimball. Observers online point out that the game itself is unlikely to have earned such a large amount on its own. It is possible that the figure includes total revenue from sales of Marvel's Spider-Man, its DLC, the remaster for PC and PlayStation 5, as well as merchandise. Additionally, Kimball might have considered the revenue from the next installment in the series — Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales, which was released shortly after he left the company.