How much revenue did Papers, Please make?

An estimated 11.4M to 30.5M net after Steam's roughly 30% cut, derived from the copies estimate and its price.

How many copies did Papers, Please sell?

Q: How many copies did Papers, Please sell?

An estimated 4.1M to 6.7M copies, based on its 79k Steam reviews. This is a labeled estimate from the review count, not exact sales.

Estimated copies sold: ≈ 4.1M–6.7M; $11.4M–$30.5M net $20.6M–$47.0M gross; from 79k reviews (Overwhelmingly Positive)

A labeled estimate from the public review count (adjusted for release year), not exact sales. Owner data cross-checked with SteamSpy.

Does this actually work?

We left Papers, Please out and predicted the genre from its 8 similar games. Every figure here, including Papers, Please's, is estimated from Steam reviews, not self-reported sales.

Copies, estimated from reviews

typical (middle half) 812k–1.2M

best case 2.0M (Age of History II)

The Simulation lane

A big, proven genre, though hit-driven: most sell around 968k copies, while a few break out far above.

A typical game

≈ 968k copies

≈ $11.5M after Steam's cut

from ~28k reviews

Best case

≈ 2.0M copies

Age of History II · ≈ $4.6M after Steam's cut

from 50k reviews

A breakout hit, far above a typical game.

4 of your 8 games sit in the typical range; 1 is a breakout hit far above it, and 3 are too small to compare.

Copies and revenue are rough lifetime estimates from the review count; typical figures are medians per column, so they can come from different games.

The lane you'd be entering

Winners here lead with Strategy + Historical, priced around $6.
The breakout hits carry Historical + War + Turn-Based Strategy; a typical game here doesn't.
The games you compared span 2015 to 2025, a lane with a long track record.
A typical game here lands in Diamond ($1M+ before Steam's cut, est.). Tiers: Chris Zukowski's benchmark tiers.

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