Welcome, you greedy Stats-gobblers, to this month's round up of all the tastiest numbers to come out of TA.
This month, we've got a veritable feast for you to munch on. My Ewok helpers, the Statisticles, have slaved away in the kitchen for hours, cooking up some scrummy numbers and I've used them to prepare a ten course taster menu just for you, which includes tasty treats and delicious delicacies, as well as a couple of surprising snacks to satiate your statisctic sweet tooth.
This report is for the period September 1st to September 30th 2012.
Games Started79,227 TrueAchievements gamers started a total of 177,660 games between them (1,943 different games).
For the Apéritif - Retail Games Started - I have a wide selection of titles to present to you. We've got a few old favourites mixed in with a selection of new entries, particularly some seasonal sporty little numbers. However, one tasty title stands far and above the others as the most popular game started this month.
Almost 1/6 of all the over 190,000 gamers tracked on TA started
Borderlands 2 this month, meaning it leads the tables with a significant margin.
That is also a severe understatament. Let's throw in some more Stats to put it into perspective. Almost ten times more people started
Borderlands 2 than its nearest competitor,
FIFA 13. Furthermore, more people started
Borderlands 2 this month than the rest of the (19!) games on the table combined.
Not statistically stunning enough for you? Well, consider this: the game has these huge numbers and it was only released in the latter 1/3 of the month, so only had about 10 days to be counted on this chart.
Annual release sports titles are littered throughout the rest of today's table, with
FIFA 13,
Madden NFL 13,
NHL 13 and
F1 2012 all making their own impact. Can anyone explain why F1 went with 2012, instead of 2013? I mean, it
is 2012 and everything, so I suppose it makes sense, but every other sports title seems to go for the 'we are forward thinking and futuristic and therefore superior and shinier' approach.
Tekken Tag Tournament 2 and
Dead or Alive 5 are the only other new releases on the table in what was mostly a rather quiet month that is otherwise filled with the big hitters from earlier in the year and quite a few from the end of last year.
Expect October's table to look a lot fresher with some big releases on the horizon.
Top Retail Games Started
Onto the Hors D'Oeuvre - Arcade Games Started - which is a little more balanced than the last course. We've got a nice selection of high-performing new titles, as well as some redesigned and reissued old favourites. And when I say old, I mean
old. Seriously, some of you may not have even been born when some of these were originally released.
In the weekly Stats articles I made a pun about how
Mark of the Ninja sneaked up to the top of the chart and left its mark. I won't say the same thing here as I don't believe in recycling jokes; that would just be cheap. Regardless, the game does make its mark after sneaking to the top....damn it!
Other new releases
Jet Set Radio,
Joe Danger 2: The Movie,
Double Dragon Neon and
Fire Pro Wrestling provide some decent numbers, with
Jet Set Radio in particular proving that nostalgia is a big deal when it comes to Arcade releases. You guys love playing games that you've already played. Similarly,
Double Dragon Neon and
Fire Pro Wrestling may not be reissues, per se, but they harken back to the old school originals of their classic series. With
NiGHTS into dreams... and
Sonic Adventure 2 out now, expect the trend to continue into next month's numbers.
A good number of older Arcade releases are strewn liberally across the chart, thanks to a lean release schedule and some nice deals this month, including
Alan Wake's American Nightmare,
The Simpsons Arcade,
Stacking,
Bejeweled 3,
Plants vs. Zombies,
Sonic 4: Episode II,
Fable Heroes,
Limbo,
Bloodforge and
3D Ultra Minigolf Adventures. In fact, that's over half the games on the table. Bargain-o-rama.
Top Arcade Games Started
Ah, the Entrée - Windows Phone Games Started - full of tasty little morsels. Many of these are the same old titles that we see time and again, but we have the occasional new title that stands out from the pack.
Say what you want about mobile gaming, but if a game lets me play as a dragon and is sort of part of the excellent
Panzer Dragoon series, then count me in, no matter the platform. Other gamers seem to agree, as
Crimson Dragon: Side Story (WP) leads the pack this week, dominating over last month's popular
Roll in the Hole (WP). Rolling in holes or burning stuff to smithereens as a freaking Dragon? I know where I stand.
Thanks to
fixed achievements and a Deal of the Week,
Monster Island (WP) picks up some respectable numbers,
Other new titles
Tiki Towers (WP) and
Contre Jour (WP), whilst popular in their respective release weeks, just don't cut it compared to the three top titles.
Top Windows Phone Games Started
Games Completed23,019 TrueAchievements gamers completed a total of 45,722 games between them (1,596 different games).
It's time for the Main Course (yes I am fully committed to this restuarant menu metaphor. I'm now curious how far I can take it). The majority of the most popular options in Retail Games Completed are actually new additions to older favourites.
Thanks to recent DLC add-ons for
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim,
Mass Effect 3 and
Battlefield 3, these older games remind everyone who's boss (and who has easy DLC completions). As predicted last month,
Sleeping Dogs stays high on the chart, retaining its solid number two place, with almost 500 more people finishing it over last month's nearly 1000 completions.
Whilst all the people who've endeavoured to finish up
Borderlands before starting on
Borderlands 2 mean that it takes a respectable number five spot this month, the sequel has yet to show its head. Only 1.7% of the sequel's many, many starters have finished the game so far. It made an appearance on this week's Games Completed stats, so expect it to also show up here next month. Will it be taking a high spot though, or will it prove a more difficult completion?
Top Retail Games Completed
Are you feeling full yet? This month's Side Dishes - Arcade Games Completed - have a similar vibe to Retail Games Started, with one title in particular being much more popular than the others. The rest of the options are a mix of old and new, but they are fairly interchangeable.
Thanks to the late August release of "Episode 3" of
The Walking Dead and its always easy completion, it storms this month's table. I'm not talking
Borderlands 2 storming, but over six times the amount of people finished it compared to its nearest competitor,
Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition, and I can also say that more people completed it than all the other games on the table combined, so the numbers still impress.
A bunch of the deal titles from Arcade Games Started (and some that were less popular, but proved easy to finish e.g.
Sam & Max Save the World) also make their presence felt in the Completed table, as it seems a lot of people picked them up cheap and whizzed through them in this otherwise fairly quiet month.
Top Arcade Games Completed
After that deliciousness, let's move on to Dessert - Windows Phone Games Completed. Yet again, I can only really recommend one option way above all the others.
Ah,
Roll in the Hole, we meet again. After making an impact on last month's chart, despite being on it for only 3 days, the game continued to roll steadily, building up steam and a heap of completions, throughout this month. With almost 1000 completions, it's fair to say this game is easy to wrap up. It's not quite the new
Collapse! (WP) I was hoping for, but currently over 69% of players have finished it.
The other games on the list are pretty interchangeable with the numbers, with the only real thing worth noting being the high number of
Monster Island completions now that people are actually able to complete it.
Top Windows Phone Games Completed
Achievements Won111,009 TrueAchievements gamers won a total of 3,563,117 achievements online between them (57,853 different achievements).
So the Desserts weren't exactly exciting, but how about the Cheese Course - Retail Achievements Won? Well, I'm afraid that these particular cheeses aren't exactly varied. They all hail for the same region: Pandora. However, what they lack in variety, they more than make up for in
big flavours.
Borderlands 2 makes a amazing, if not exactly surprising, clean sweep on the table. This is mostly due to the sheer bulk of players working their way through it, but is also helped by easy achievements, such as
First One's Free, which is literally handed to you at the beginning.
Top Retail Achievements Won
I can offer you a little more variety with the Petit Fours - Arcade Achievements Won - but not much, with only 3 different titles producing all of this month's entries.
All of
The Walking Dead's "Episode 3" achievements unsurprisingly take the lead this month, but
Mark of the Ninja also leaves its mark (oh, shoot. Chewie, y u no make original jokes?!) and the easiest achievements for
Rock Band Blitz show up at the bottom.
Top Arcade Achievements Won
We're getting close to the end of our time together, so now I can offer you some Coffee. Today's blend involves a dragon roasting the beans thoroughly with his fiery breath in
Crimson Dragon: A Side Story, a giant panda rolling around crushing them in
Roll in the Hole, and some monsters...well...they defecated on them in
Monster Island. Sorry. But they do say that monster poop is the tastiest poop, so that's something.
Top Windows Phone Achievements Won
Finally, try some tasty Genre Digestifs. But, be careful, they can be a little intoxicating.
Thanks to a little game you may have heard of entitled
Borderlands 2, Role-Playing jumps from third to the top spot this month, taking out perennial chart-toppers Action-Adventure and Shooter. I have a feeling
Resident Evil 6 will restore the balance next month.
However, that also depends on how
Dishonored ends up being classified here on TA. Will it be Role-Playing or Action-Adventure?
The sheer abundance of Sports titles this month pushes it up from fifth to fourth, but I don't expect it to stay very high for long.
Total TrueAchievements won by Genre
-
Action-Adventure22,178,513
Thank you for dining at Chez Chewie. I hope you found the meal both tasty and filling. You obviously did, I can see you've got some numbers dribbling down your chin, you greedy Statsoholic.
Also, I must assure you that it's purely coincidence that some of the meaty dishes tasted just like Ewok. What do you mean 'How do you know what Ewok tastes like?' [shifty eyes].