This part about Clair Obscur was surprising going by online talk.

Ranked 25th on US PlayStation last week. This is one of those games that dedicated players are talking a lot about but hasn't yet crossed over into mass market. It's incredibly difficult for games to crack these lists with all the service behemoths.

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 9:40 AM

I think it just goes to show how incredibly fucking difficult it is to crack into this list filled with blackhole games anymore, I mean, we know for a fact that Expedition 33 has been a big success, we know for a fact that Oblivion Remaster is performing better than it, but even Oblivion Remaster can only hit #15 on PlayStation Store without Game Pass to back it up.

Though I do think Oblivion Remaster will climb up the charts, as will Expedition 33 and I do think that #25 for Expedition 33 is a bit lower than I thought even with the blackhole games, I'd have thought maybe #16-#20 but even so, both titles have been huge successes and yet...They even struggle to enter these lists.

Almost everything on the list is either a blackhole GaaS/MP title, a F2P title, or a title which is available on Game Pass and/or PS Plus. The only exception to this is Oblivion Remaster and Assassin's Creed Shows which are both massive IPs, Lol. But it's showing to us how incredibly difficult it is, especially for single-player only titles, to get onto this list, unless they're also available on a sub service or massive IPs.

Shits crazy, it makes some of the Game Pass debuts even more impressive.

After just one week in market (w/e 4.26) Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion: Remastered is already the 3rd best-selling game of 2025 in the US ($ sales) trailing only Monster Hunter: Wilds and Assassin's Creed: Shadows.

It was the best-selling game of the week.

Source: Circana Retail Tracking Service

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 5 May 2025 at 16:27

It's almost like a game has to go viral in some capacity to have any sort of chance of making a dent in the gaming landscape. The hardcore crowd just isn't enough anymore and/or we've lost a good chunk of the hardcore crowd to the black hole service games lol.

Damn, if it weren't for the shadowdrop, it would've been number 1!!!

It's hilarious how you can be the 3rd best selling game of the year so far, best selling game of the week, and still barely crack top 15 on PlayStation total weekly active users, Lol. Ignoring Xbox because we're talking about sales here and most Xbox players will be Game Pass, but yeah it's yet another show of how incredibly dominate the GAAS titles are in this list.

You basically NEED to be a massive IP now to crack into it, or be available on Game Pass, or hit a viral moment.

Anyway, that's an amazing performance for Oblivion Remastered.

I think this also shows how important the PC market has become to gaming these days. With consoles being stagnant in terms of overall playerbase, PC gaming doesn't have those limitations. It's grown so much that it's already passed consoles and it's only continuing to grow. Most likely why Microsoft is looking at merging console and PC gaming with the next Xbox.

It's such a large base that despite majority still stuck in the black hole service games themselves, even moreso with Counter-Strike, League, and Dota 2 being PC only, there's still more than enough room for indie games and AA games such as Expedition 33 to find their audience.

Fuck sake, the leakers got it wrong, it was a remaster of Gears 1 only, not Gears 2-3 as well, they've already remastered Gears 1 damnit! I wanted to replay Gears 2-3! At least Gears UE digital owners get the upgrade for free, that's nice.