Shovel Knight Digs For Victory With 300,000 Copies Sold

I am! I bought it on 3DS and it is Awesome. Go buy it!

I really need to pick this up sometime.

Nice one. I'd like to see a fresh by-platform breakdown. I assume the eShop has managed to maintain sales better than PC.

great game

My question is whether these numbers include backers who redeemed their codes? It's important to know how exactly the numbers come together.

Yes, I was not a backer on Kickstarter but I backed this on the eShop. The Wii U version.

For an awesome game.....sure has disappointing sales.....

I bought both versions and enjoy one at home and the other on the road.

It seems that Yacht Club Games' new favourite number is 300,000

Got this on the u, and can't wait to revisit it when yacht club can start working on those content updates. If they were able to offer some sort of cross-platform discount, I'd get the 3ds version as well.

@Artwark - disappointing for who?

Yacht Club is probably happy with that kind of payday.

I was thinking about getting this game on 3ds?

But I am wondering if it was made for more a bigger screen because it looks to small on the 3ds.

Anyone played it on the 3ds?

Bought on two Wii Us.

This is an incredible success, though. Much of those sales were likely at $15 without sales or giveaways. Nearly unheard of for indie games.

@zool It's great on the 3DS, no worries there.

However, I definitely prefer the Wii U version, which will also eventually get a multiplayer battle mode in an update.

Got it on release EU. This game is packed with pure awesomeness and whoever owns a wii u or 3ds. If you didn't buy this game already. Shame on U!

I also have it on Wii U. It's awesome. But damn hard, like games used to be.

Was tempted to get the 3DS version too with the 30% discount offer. But the price is still too high to justify another copy of the same game. Cross buy would be ideal, but whatever.

Another great indie game I have missed out on. I need to check it out

I got it on the Wii U and loved it!

Bought both versions for Nintendo. Completely satisfied

Bring the sequel on!

@WaveWarlock $15 - 300,000 copies. 5 people. That is about 0.9 million dollars each. (Presuming it is split like that). Seems brilliant to me.

So glad it worked out. It's my game of the year.

To everyone who thinks they made a lot of money: There's an article out there where the completely present their whole development process. The worked without a paycheck since may. With this success the pretty much break even with having earned a normal average salary in the last 18 month...

Bought the great game on both WiiU and 3DS on release day.

I supported the 3DS version because I still do like the 3D effect. Great numbers.

@WaveWarlock So games like Kid Icarus and Fire Emblem sell well and are awesome because.....?

That seems surprisingly low considering the hype and the quality of the game. Hopefully that's not including backer copies. I pictured this to be a million-seller for sure.

This accounts for at least 3.6$ million in gross sales, I have no idea what the break down is on what percent the Dev gets...

I want it to sell even more. I think it deserves to.

I hope that's in line with or exceeding their expectations. Such a fun game. I'm so happy to support quality work like this.

@ACK thank you I may give it a go.

A brilliant game, I really enjoyed it and the sequel will be an automatic purchase for me.

I bought this yesterday on Wii U, very fun and I may double dip with adding 3DS version if I get Alpha Sapphire for Christmas.

I think some people's sales expectations are unrealistic. Perhaps that's due to hearing how many millions various AAA, franchise games sell, but they're very different. I suspect 300,000+ sales would be considered quite successful, especially considering it's a new developer(in name) with a new property and limited marketing. It would be interesting to know what Yacht Club was expecting. I just recently became aware that the game was available for a platform I currently have, so I will be picking this one up rather soon. I'm definitely excited to play it.

Still need to get it, but I'm still thinking of which version, 3d or HD on WiiU... Also, given it's succes, and some downloadable games still getting retail versions, I'm really hoping this one gets that same treatment... It certainly seems worthy of it, to be visible in stores and collections everywhere.

@Artwark I think, unlike many big budget developers, indies are more still in the game-making business, rather than the money-making business. Also, they don't spend a small fortune on marketing.

Deserves to sell 300 million. GOTY for me, and that is with fierce competition. Whatever Yacht Club puts out in the future, I will buy. That is how impressed I am.

It's so nice to hear that a great game gets it's due reward.

It's the next game on my e shop list!! I WILL get 1final ddl promo code before it ends

As one of the nearly 15,000 original Kickstarter backers of Shovel Knight, I'm glad the Yacht Club Team found critical and commercial success with their project; and I wish them future successes as well! (I got the PC version, of course, since that was the only DRM-free option.)

To think, they started off with not much more of a budget (about $311,502) than their current individual sales numbers... Soon, those numbers will rise above their original budget. This can only be called a resounding success, and proof that not every project needs to be a multimillion dollar big name producer product to be profitable! Five years ago, most business people would have laughed at you for suggesting it would be possible to self-produce big projects without venture capital. Who's laughing now?

I shall grab both versions when they appear on a sale hopefully in the near future, if only all good games were rewarded with decent sales.

@Monsti They didn't make a huge bankroll, true, but the point is that they worked on what they wanted, without caving in to what some board of directors or marketing moguls wanted, and still overall salaried about as much individually as anyone else could expect to make working for a big publisher. All without the rediculous expectations, innate crunch time, and unpaid mandatory overtime of big publishers. (And predictable layoffs at the end of projects to avoid end of project benefits, if we're talking strictly American companies.) It's still hard work, but it's more flexible and voluntary.

It begs the question: if you can make a project work through the crowdfunding model (though that's a big if), why rely on the big publishers for work? Why not work for the public instead?

It seriously deserves 1 million, but that's not going to happen if sales are going at this pace.

I have bought the WiiU version the day it came out in EU, played the first three or four stages but it didn't grab me at all, so I will get back to it soon.

@unrandomsam 6 including Jake Kaufman.

@zool I bought both WiiU and 3DS versions and thought I would prefer WiiU but surprisingly it turns out that the 3D effect is done really well I usually turn 3D off on most games but I always have it on for Shovel Knight. I'm playing on an XL so screens are a good size they're definitely big enough for Shovel Knight. So yes Shovel knight on 3DSXL is worth it can't say the same for the old 3DS or 2DS, new 3DS might be big enough too.

Well, It certainly.deserves the sales. It's one of my favorite games on the Wii U and that is saying something considering how many great games there are on the system.

Good to hear that it sold well since it was very well deserved! One of the very best games on the E-Shop!

If this was Ubisoft, they'd be talking about how poor the game did, especially on Nintendo systems.

@Kaze_Memaryu
Does not matter much. 300,000 at 15 bucks a copy, only menas 20,000 gamers. That is less than 7% of total sales. If you factor in supporters that spent more than 15 dollars on a copy, then their number is even lower.

The fact is that Shovel Knight is an excellent game that transcended its Kickstarter's origin by a mile!!

@Monsti
Still, they asked for 75,000, got 300,000 on Kickstarter and has sold 300,000 copies, that translates to about 3.5-4.0 million (there has been a couple of PC sales for less than 15 bucks). So, I think that they have been quite successful and have made quite a bit of money.

@maceng It's still important to know, for me at least
Calling Shovel Knight great is somewhat of an overstatement, though. It's a good game, but it could've been much better than it is.

@PlywoodStick Absolutely. I think that's why they wrote that giant article. They wanted to show it can work. It was tough (they said 12-17 hour days 7 days a week) but it worked.

Congrats to the team for winning Indie Game of the Year at the Video Game Awards.

This game should be played by everyone, 300,000 is still not enough. But hey, at least they got a good amount of money

This is a retro NES-style game. I'm really surprised that some of you feel this number is disappointingly low. Personally, I love this game. Really made me feel like I did when playing the games its paying homage to. Plus, it's fun and interesting in its own rite. So glad to see those guys succeed, but the number of people serious enough to consider paying $15 for a game that archaic looking are a tiny percentage of gamers — enough to support 5 devs though!

It can't hurt that they got Indie Game of the Year at the Video Game Awards — did a little cheer when they won. That show was good enough that it might actually gain some attention from word of mouth over the next few days.

I got it on the 3DS a couple of weeks ago and I am enjoying it so damn much!

That's good, i was gonna get it for 3ds but I ended up getting it on Wii U. This game is coming to the Sony systems with Kratos joining in. They might as well make it for Microsoft systems too, I hope a sequel is in the works.

Wuu version, here.

@maceng $4 million divided by the entire staff's individual salaries.

Looks like a few of us double dipped. I like playing Shovel Knight on the Wii U when I have a friend over. We take turns. But I do like it a little better on the 3DS. It's a great well made game either way.