Genres

Ticker: price and year-over-year change for 40 genres. Price is the median estimated first-year revenue of indie paid launches. The same figures are on the Genres page.

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Game Market DataBuild what sells
Live games
191,514
on 30 Sep 2026

Idea check

Pick up to three tags and a price. Get a plain answer: your odds of a $100k first year, what launches like yours earned, what you are up against, and what to watch for.

1Your idea

2The readout

Your odds

23 in 100 Automation + Sandbox launches at any price earned $100k+ in their first year. That is better than the 1 in 16 for all indie launches: about 3.7 times the rate.

Chance of $100k+

23 in 100

Notch: 1 in 16 for all indie launches.

Typical first year

$3,397

3% of the way to $100k. Half earned less. Notch: $606, all indie launches.

Competition

88 launches

At any price, in two years (about 44 a year). Busier than 50 in 100 tag pairs; the notch is the middle one.

Coming soon

269 games

Coming-soon games with these tags. More than 87 in 100 tag pairs. Highest on wishlists: Substructure (#498), Bioneers (#1,185).

What launches like this earned in their first year

Only the typical figure is measured for this lens.

Typical launchHalf earned less$3,3973% of the way to $100k.
Top quarter1 in 4 earned at leastNot computed yet: West-facing view figures carry the typical launch only.
Top tenth1 in 10 earned at leastNot computed yet: West-facing view figures carry the typical launch only.

Automation + Sandbox at any price past the $100k line (squeezed to fit, not to scale) all indie launches

Warning lamps

All clear
  • One-hit marketOff

    Clear.

  • Audience splitOff

    Clear.

  • Small sampleOff

    Clear.

  • May be luckOff

    Clear.

  • Changed recentlyOff

    Clear.

Lens checkHolds in 3 of 3. Standard: the yardstick. West-facing view: holds. Without the breakout: holds. Last 18 months: holds.

Standard, West-facing view, Without the breakout, Last 18 months. Lenses use all prices.

Earnings are estimated from store reviews, so the $100k line is soft: across the estimate's range, the share of all indie launches above it runs from about 5 to 8 in 100.

Indie paid launches 6 to 30 months old, measured 1 Oct 2026. Coming-soon counts from the store, 30 Sep 2026.

3What next

Monthly read

Free

A monthly read on Automation + Sandbox

Once a month we re-measure your odds at any price and tell you in plain words what changed.

  • Your odds, re-measured on the latest launches
  • How last month's launches with these tags did
  • Who is about to launch, highest on wishlists first
If the read went out today 1 Oct 2026
  1. Your odds23 in 100 earned $100k+ at any price, against 1 in 16 for all indie launches.
  2. EarningsTypical first year $3,397.
  3. Launches103 games of every kind with these tags in the last 12 months (43 the year before).
  4. Coming soon269 games; highest on wishlists Substructure (#498).

One email a month. No spam, leave with one click.

Comparables

Lifetime

Top earners with these tags, est. lifetime grossFree until launch

The Last Caretakerlaunched 2025, 13,344 reviews$9.4M
1The Last Caretaker$9.4M2025
2shapez 2 - Factory$8.1M2024
3Cash Cleaner Simulator$2.9M2025
4Graveyard Keeper 2$2.7M2026
5The Crust$2.4M2024
Open free preview
ComparablesFree until launchClick to unlockLifetime top earners like yours

4Data notes

Odds and earnings
Wave-a figures, generated 1 Oct 2026: 29,637 indie paid launches 6 to 30 months old (majors, $40+, adult and free games out). A hit is an estimated first-year revenue of $100k or more. "Typical" is the median; "top quarter" is the 75th percentile and "top tenth" the 90th.
Tags and combinations
329 tags (genres and descriptors such as 2D and Casual), 5,145 tag pairs and 9,720 three-tag combinations. Pairs and triples are only in the data with 40 or more launches, so a missing one has fewer than 40; the exact count is not stored.
Price band rates
under $5: 1 in 200 (15,379 launches); $5 to $10: 1 in 26 (8,218 launches); $10 to $20: 19 in 100 (4,810 launches); $20 to $40: 42 in 100 (1,230 launches). All prices: 1 in 16. With "Any price", the comparison is all indie launches.
Gauges
Competition places the pick among combinations of the same size (single tags, pairs or triples) at the same price; coming soon places single tags and pairs among all genres and niches. The notch is the middle one. Earnings notches show every game at the price.
Lamps
One-hit market: one game holds over half the money, or dropping it moves the chance over 25%. Audience split: the West-facing view (games mostly reviewed outside China) moves typical earnings over 10% or the chance over 25%. Small sample: under 30 launches. May be luck: the gap to the base rate is inside what chance produces 95 times in 100 (a two-sided binomial test). Changed recently: launches from the last 18 months move the chance over 25%, or there are under 10 of them.
Lens check
Computed on all-price figures (by-price lens figures are not computed yet). Standard is the yardstick and is not counted. Three-tag combinations carry no lenses yet, so their pips stay grey.
Competition
Launches in the two-year sample. Coming-soon counts for tags and pairs come from the nightly niche rollup (30 Sep 2026); for three tags, from the coming-soon list, which stores only each game's top five tags, so the count is a floor. Named games are the highest on wishlists; adult-tagged games are left out.
Comparables
The top indie earners stored for these tags, with estimated lifetime gross (not first year). Three-tag combinations have none stored, so the card shows the most specific readable pair inside and says so. Matching by price and launch year is not computed yet.
Soft estimate
Revenue is reviews times a multiplier times price. Across the multiplier's range the overall base rate runs 4.8% to 8.4%, so every readout carries that note.
Releases

Ticker: 30 upcoming games dated within 90 days, with wishlist rank, release date and followers. The same list is on the Upcoming page.