What You Want To Hear: Saints Row IV Sold Well

Deep Silver have had quite the couple of years. They've gone from a European publisher of quietly successful strategy games and RPGs (the X games, Gothic, others), to finding mainstream success with Dead Island, to picking up where THQ left off with Metro: Last Light and Saints Row 4.

In an interview with Deep Silver's CEO, The Penny Arcade Report mention that Saints Row IV has sold triple that of Saints Row 3 on PC over the same time period, and that Metro: Last Light sold more across all platforms in a single week than the original did in three months.

Like the original, Metro: Last Light was equal parts shonky and polished, but it was an interesting game. Saints Row IV was, like its immediate predecessor, wonderfully silly, and better than its rushed production would have suggested. I'm glad these games are doing well, and I'm glad they're doing well on PC. This is news.

There is another, juicier part of this story though, which I've buried down here. After championing the sales success, CEO Klemens Kundratitz talked about the company's approach to piracy.

"Many publishers are not launching day and date because the PC is so difficult, but they fear the piracy issues, so they’d rather first focus on consoles," he said. When the Penny Arcade Report asked if Deep Silver have considered launching a service similar to Origin or uPlay, Kundratitz was definitive. "We have not, no. Uplay is not the way we want to approach things, definitely. I think we just need to make sure that the games we publish are worth the money, and certainly there is always this piracy situation that any publisher has. No publisher can tackle, really." He continued, "In a business plan, we typically ignore it. It’s not something that is new, it’s something that has been part of our business for decades. As a publisher you just live with it, yes?"

This is the sort of thing we like to hear, which is probably why it was said, and that's why I've put it at the end of the story and not at the top. It's good that Deep Silver don't plan to release a swarm of killer bees into the population any time soon, but CEO's of large companies tend not to be naive about public perception.

If we're to judge Deep Silver - and you don't have to, you can just go play a videogame - then lets do it based on their actions and not on their compelling headlines. Saints Row 4 was joyful! Supporting modding is good! Apologising for a horrible thing and then doing it anyway is terrible! I like PCs. The frogurt is also cursed. Here is a GIF of a sea lion which is too heavy.