Shovel Knight is one of the finest download titles on the Wii U and 3DS, making such an impact across multiple systems that it's also had a physical retail release and its own amiibo. Since its release in 2014 it's won numerous Game of the Year awards, and Yacht Club Games has continued to produce free content in order to delight fans and deliver on its original crowdfunded stretch goals.
The studio has recently confirmed that overall sales have hit 1.2 million units, a fantastic number. Around a million of those are downloads, with the other 200,000 being physical retail sales on Wii U, 3DS, PS4 and PC. Nintendo systems have accounted for a substantial volume of those sales, well over half a million. Meanwhile about 180,000 of the amiibo have been sold.
There's a detailed blog post that we highly recommend giving a read, and the infographic below provides a handy visual summary.
To celebrate these results there will be two new 3DS HOME Themes coming soon, on 28th April in North America and 13th May in Europe.
First up is 'Shovel Knight Campfire Dream', which has The Requiem of Shield Knight as music.
Then there's 'Plague Knight's Theme', which has Flowers of Antimony (The Explodatorium) as music.
It's terrific to see such significant success for Shovel Knight, and with more content still to come. Let us know what you think of these sales results and the upcoming 3DS HOME Themes in the comments.
Further Reading:
[source yachtclubgames.com]
Comments 65
Happy for them. It's a terrific game
I love that campfire theme, I'll probably get that.
Shovel Knight was terrific, I can't wait to see what Yacht Club does next. It's nice to see it succeed on such a variety of platforms.
Well done, guys.
Those amiibo sales figures are pretty dang impressive too. That's quite a few bucks in the coffer right there.
All of your success was totally earned and well deserved.
Great game, great attitude towards marketing, development, great policy on DLC and nice amiibo bonus content.
Deserved success.
There's going to be a Specter Knight campaign?
Squee!
Plague of Shadows cost $1,000,000!? I kinda feel guilty for abandoning it after a few stages.
I have the physical release on Wii U due to be delivered today from Amazon. Can't wait to see what the fuss is all about! Already have the Amiibo as well, such a cool looking figure.
Good sales for sure, but those play figures are a bit depressing. Only 32% completion rate? Only 6% completed Plague Knight DLC, despite the costing one million to develop? Kinda makes me think free DLC isn't worth it. That's a lot of development money for such a muted response from the players.
So much for people thinking Nintendo fans don't support 3rd party games. I hope this encourages other Devs to bring games to 3DS like Star Dew Valley. I would love that.
@Mogster
It is a bit of a bummer, but I think those numbers sound right for any game, not just Shovel Knight.
Most people don't complete games anymore.
@Mogster is that just data from Steam though? I don't know if Nintendo is capturing that kind of data.
I'm of the 2% that hasn't finished new game plus YET. Best indy game together with Guacamelee.
@Utena-mobile So many people never even play the games they buy on steam let alone finish them....
All those sales cause people to have stupid huge backlogs.
I bought it around launch but only finished it last week. I don't think I'll be playing any of the other campaigns. I didn't even finish the intro stage with plague knight.
I just hope they can add more DLC in the form of the other bosses having their own quests, and Shield Knight too. I don't care paying for that if the price is right.
I still use that theme that was bundled with the game when it was first released in Europe and Australia, I'll probably fork out some money for these too. Glad they're doing well for themselves, they deserve it.
Wonderful game and I'm interested in how King Knight mode turns out
Shovel Knight is about as good as the modern-retro games get. Really hoping they'll add in Shield Knight at some point.
Ok,ok,ok I'm gonna finally have to breakdown and buy this game. Can anyone recommend wich Platform? Wiiu, 3ds,ps4 or,pc?
@Rafx PS4 probably has the best exclusive content. You get the God of War blades as a weapon, and they look very dank and I'm super jell cuz I don't have a PS4.
@Ichi Perhaps, but for 5-9 people to get a game in the hands of 1.2 million people is still quite impressive.
That's between 133,333-240,000 sales for every person working on the game.
Considering the teams of several hundreds that work on most AAA games (often spread across the globe) and I think it's quite an achievement.
Buy the Amiibo!
I was shocked to find out that it is one of the best co-op games every made!
Shovel Knight for president!
I tried the Plague of Shadows campaign but I just didn't like it as much as regular Shovel Knight.
@Rafx WiiU without question if you like co-op games. Shovel Knight should have gotten a new review with that mode. It now goes to 11!
Amazing game deserves amazing sales. This is the best indie I've ever played and it'll just be getting better. btw, I'll buy SK amiibo soon, it's very pretty.
I still have yet to play this game. I suck.
Didn't realize I was so rare for completing Plague Knight
Very good news and thoroughly deserved. A shining example of how to do an indie game right in every regard, be it the follow up DLC, an amiibo, physical release, 3DS themes, promotion and at the basis of it all, a quality game.
Interesting data
Both of the songs that I like from that ost. I'll be excited to try the new content and the new themes. How weird that I switched to the shovel knight theme a couple days ago.
Good for you Yacht Club! You deserve it!!
So cool to see the great numbers for 3DS , Wii U and amiibo. This is a perfect world situation, the Nintendo power...
Nice data! I hope Super Shovel Knight with 16-bit graphics is on the cards.
Shovel Knight is really cool and probably one of these best indie games I've ever played, but I'm ready for Yaht Club to begin focusing on the next project.
Good for them, the game deserves the success it has had. Interesting to see how heavily weighted towards nintendo platforms both download and retail sales are
Very well put together game. Good use of amiibo too. I've got my Han Shovo up to level 50.
On another note, people need to get beating Plague Knights campaign! 6 percent is kind of despressing
@Rafx get it on Wii U, not only do you get to use the gamepad for off TV which makes it home console OR portable, but also because of the Amiibo support. I've played more co-op shovel knight than single player shovel knight.
Yes 3DS also works with the Amiibo, but it won't do co-op on 3DS so if that appeals to you then do Wii U if not then the Amiibo has other cool functions like customizing your Shovel Knight which you can do on either system
@grumblebuzzz me too, but in their crowd funding campaign they promised more functionality and I personally can't wait for the 4 player battle mode
If plague of shadows cost a million bucks to create and they're making all those other DLC options and giving them away for free, are they going to lose money in the end? I really hope not, but I"m worried
Do the people that got the game "free" for funding them count towards the 1.2 million sales?
Do you need the amiibo to play the Plague Knight campaign and coop? I have the game and am not sure about these things, so the 6% figure is not surprising.
Yacht Club Games... Oh how I love thee. Let me count the ways...
@Mr_Zurkon no 3DS ports allowed, stinky alien.
Konami needs to let Yacht Club make a new Castlevania game.
better get on with that sequel then...
Very well deserved as it's such a fantastic game. Going to pick the amiibo up ASAP.
Thank god the WiiU's sales made a huge splash so we can expect continued support and future support on either the WiiU or a future TV console from them.
Happy to see those numbers. Shovel Knight is an amazing game.
@hefferj No, you don't need the amiibo for Plague Knight. He came as a free update. It's co-op that you need the amiibo for.
And well deserved too! I haven't played the game since launch so I have yet to give Plague Knight's campaign or the challenges a go, but I plan on fixing that soon. This game is without a doubt one of the best indie games I have played and I am really hoping they go for a SNES stylized sequel, or maybe even Shovel Knight 64!
I am part of the 94% plague problem, but I purposefully delayed that campaign so that time would erase the memories of my first run...but I guess 6 months is long enough.
@grumblebuzzz That's precisely how I feel. They still have so much free stuff to give away, and that worries me, both because it can't be financially sound for them, and because I'd really like to see what other games these guys can bring to life.
@leo13 They didn't get the game for free. They paid, in advance, a value above a specific tier in order to get it (generally around the price of the actual game). That's how Kickstarter works.
@ricklongo Yes I know how it works that's why I put "free" in quotes because some people would say they donated to the cause and got the game for free as a thank-you and others would say they paid for it by funding them.
BUT THAT WASN'T MY QUESTION
Do those people count towards the 1.2 million or have 1.2 million people paid for the game SINCE it was released?
@GravyThief This is one game I can honestly say isn't overhyped at all. It's incredible. Enjoy!
Man they spent so much money on the Plague of Shadows DLC and only 6% of PC players beat it
Loving my retail PS4 copy of Shovel Knight! I nearly cried when I flipped through the instruction manual. So much nostalgia for the old manuals, especially the Notes section, the first casualty in the movement to make manuals thinner.
One of my favorite games ever. I have beaten it multiple times on every mode. Normal, hard, Plague of Shadows, co-op. It's all terrific.
Oh so they use svn too...
And a team size of 9 with 4 development babies? wut?
lesson learned: people actually don't give a s**t to DLC
@leo13 They should definitely count. I don't see why not.
They're doing 2 more free campaigns!? That's nuts!
@sevex $2,000,000 more for zero return! I actually think they need to move on. I love Shovel Knight. Plague Knight is awesome. Maybe this strategy will work where they being more and more people in with a bigger and bigger value proposition. Maybe.
And maybe I just want them to move on because I can't wait to see what they do next!
"Note, for a $24.99 copy of the retail game, we receive a 3-4 dollars less than our digital release, which sells for $14.99. Also, we still haven’t actually been paid for retail product due to the long tail of not knowing if all the units will sell."
So, a gamer pays an extra $10 to give the creators of the game $3-4 less. The opposite of supporting the people who make the games you like.
Sometimes I just think retail games need to die. I know many prefer it, but... ugh. Create piles of garbage and pay a bunch of middle men to give less money to the developer for the game you like. All so you can resell it for a few dollars?
Yes, digital needs to improve from a customer point of view (security in ownership, sharing options), but retail discs and boxes and paper instructions need to go away. You want special physical additional materials for super-fans, fine, but the default distribution for mass-gaming needs to switch over much more quickly. So much useless waste.
And I know that in reality the market still can't bear it, but it's just frustrating to watch. And I keep buying retail because of better deals, amiibo pack-ins, and Nintendo's frustrating digital policy. Probably the greatest news that could come with NX would be a more customer-friendly and generous digital-game policy.
@aaronsullivan You are actually right. I do love Shovel Knight, but I'd also love to see what else these guys would come up with if they moved on to something new.
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