How much revenue did Journey make?

$3.9M–$10.6M after Steam's roughly 30% cut, derived from the copies estimate and its price.

How many copies did Journey sell?

Q: How many copies did Journey sell?

958k to 1.6M copies, based on its 39k Steam reviews. This is a labeled estimate from the review count, not exact sales.

Estimated copies sold: ≈ 958k–1.6M; $3.9M–$10.6M after Steam's cut $7.2M–$16.3M before Steam's cut; from 39k reviews (Very Positive)

Copies are estimated from the public review count, adjusted for release year, and cross-checked against SteamSpy's own estimate.

Did the prediction match what actually happened?

We hid Journey and predicted how it would do from its 8 similar games. Every figure here, including Journey's, is estimated from Steam reviews.

Copies, estimated from reviews

typical (middle half) 6.2M–9.6M

best case 34.9M (Red Dead Redemption 2)

Games like Journey

A typical game among these

≈ 6.2M–9.6M copies

≈ $83.8M–$150.2M after Steam's cut

from ~201k reviews

Only the top fifth of 2019's Steam releases earned $34k or more before Steam's cut, so plan for that or less.

All 8 of the similar games are hits.

No genre covers most of these similar games. The closest is Story Rich (4 of 8), so its genre is hard to place.

Of the 416 indie games that passed 1,000 reviews in 2022, 11.8% were novel genre mixes and 88.2% stuck to an established genre. Published indie market research.

Best case: Red Dead Redemption 2 at ≈ 26.6M–43.2M copies, ≈ $438.4M–$1178.6M after Steam's cut. It is a breakout hit, far above a typical game.

What their first month looked like

About half the games that made it here had over 23k reviews in their first month; the range was 951 to 69k.

The genre you'd be entering

These games: The similar games share Story Rich (4 of 8) and First-Person (2 of 8).
The winners: Winners here lead with Open World + Story Rich, priced around $60. The breakout hits carry Western + Open World + Realistic; a typical game here doesn't.
When they shipped: The similar games span 2013 to 2022, and none of them shipped in the last two years.

How these numbers were worked out

A hit here: 1,000+ reviews, roughly $150k+ before Steam's cut (a standard indie benchmark).

Copies come from each game's reviews times a sales-per-review rate that falls with release age, from about 31 for the most recent game here to about 79 for the oldest, then widened into a range; revenue rides on that estimate times price. Source: GameDiscoverCo (2020) and VG Insights (2021).

Similar games

Game	Est. copies	Est. revenue	Price	Reviews	Tags
Ori and the Will of the Wisps 2020	Est. copies ≈ 3.6M–5.9M SteamSpy 2M–5M	Est. revenue $30.0M–$80.6M after Steam's cut $54.5M–$124.0M before Steam's cut	$29.99	147k reviews Overwhelmingly Positive	BeautifulMetroidvania
Detroit: Become Human 2020	Est. copies ≈ 6.6M–10.7M SteamSpy 2M–5M	Est. revenue $72.1M–$193.9M after Steam's cut $131.1M–$298.3M before Steam's cut	$39.99	264k reviews Overwhelmingly Positive	Choices MatterStory Rich
Stray 2022	Est. copies ≈ 4.4M–7.2M SteamSpy 5M–10M	Est. revenue $36.6M–$98.3M after Steam's cut $66.5M–$151.3M before Steam's cut	$29.99	179k reviews Overwhelmingly Positive	CatsAdventure
The Sims™ 4 2020	Est. copies ≈ 5.0M–8.1M SteamSpy 10M–20M	Est. revenue Free	Free	201k reviews Very Positive	Life SimCharacter Customization
Halo: The Master Chief Collection 2019	Est. copies ≈ 7.6M–12.3M SteamSpy 5M–10M	Est. revenue $83.3M–$223.9M after Steam's cut $151.4M–$344.5M before Steam's cut	$39.99	263k reviews Very Positive	Great SoundtrackFPS
Red Dead Redemption 2 2019	Est. copies ≈ 26.6M–43.2M 4.6x vs typical SteamSpy 10M–20M	Est. revenue $438.4M–$1178.6M after Steam's cut $797.0M–$1813.3M before Steam's cut	$59.99	923k reviews Very Positive	Open WorldStory Rich
Forza Horizon 5 2021	Est. copies ≈ 7.0M–11.4M SteamSpy 5M–10M	Est. revenue $115.3M–$310.1M after Steam's cut $209.7M–$477.1M before Steam's cut	$59.99	282k reviews Very Positive	RacingOpen World
BioShock Infinite 2013	Est. copies ≈ 9.2M–15.0M SteamSpy 2M–5M	Est. revenue $76.0M–$204.4M after Steam's cut $138.2M–$314.4M before Steam's cut	$29.99	146k reviews Very Positive	FPS Story Rich