GTA Ousts Skyrim As Steam's Most Played 3rd Party Game

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. I celebrated if one of the bands I like got a single in the top 10; I took it very personally if they failed to. Because enough of my peers had also not loved whichever band of posturing men-with-guitars it was, society was in ruins. Is that, perhaps, how some Skyrim fans feel at news their beloved RPG has been toppled by GTA V as the game with most concurrent users ever on Steam, if you exclude Valve's own games? And are GTA fans celebrating that their prized cars'n'murder game has claimed another scalp?

GTA V mustered over 301,000 folk playing the game at once, reports GamesIndustry, beating Skyrim's 280,000 and change back when Bethesda's dragon-botherer first launched. However, these are but tears in the rain against some of Valve's own offerings - Dota 2 had over 800,000 players in the same period that GTA was doing its thing, while olden hatfest Team Fortress 2 also exceeded 300k during that time. Which is pretty crazy: even GTA V, a name as big as it gets in 'traditional' games, can't beat what Valve are up to with their now fairly old free to play fare.

Still, Rockstar's PC version of GTA V gets to say its the most-played third party game on Steam ever, depending on how you narrow down that phrase 'most-played.' Delays, two different console versions and a troubled launch haven't done anything to dim its appeal to players of PC games, and that means more even houses made of gold for Rockstar's bosses.