Industry Insider Jeff Grubb has said on the latest episode of his Game Mess Decides podcast that Hi-Fi Rush “didn’t make the money it needed to make”.
UPDATE – Aaron Greenberg has issued a small statement on Twitter refuting these comments. You can see our coverage here.
Hi-Fi Rush was first announced on January 25, 2023, and released on the same day as a shadow drop. Initially, Tango Gameworks and Bethesda were praised for the huge surprise, but that seemingly hasn’t translated into revenue.
“Based on what I’ve heard, it just straight up didn’t make the money it needed to make”, said Grubb. “It got good reviews, and the buzz was good, so where do you put the blame for something like that?”, he continued.
According to Bethesda, the game reached two million players by March 1, but with a considerable amount of these players likely playing via Game Pass – Grubb’s comments on what he’s heard make a lot of sense.
In late February, director John Johanas said that the game received 10,000 Steam reviews nearly a full month after release. Shadowdropping the game was praised, but a lack of marketing could have negatively impacted its overall sales and reception.
The Game Pass model is a good one and it’s considered one of the best deals in gaming, but understandably it makes it difficult to gauge what is considered a success for Microsoft.
Do you think Hi-Fi Rush was a success? Let us know in the comments below.
Want more Insider Gaming? Check out details on the next Diablo 4 beta coming in May.
The game was successful to a certain degree but could have been better with more marketing that’s not only the case with hi-fi rush but with a lot of other Xbox games I thinks Xbox have to emphasize on marketing their exclusive games no game is ever to small and should be neglected just look at high on life and pentiment two wonderful games or even the last case of benedict fox that I’m eager to play but no advertisment worse no physical release! No collector edition nothing! please do not wait for big triple A games for these kind of stuff exclusive games should always have a physical version be it on game pass or not I love the attention they give to redfall with the little character interviews and so on that’s a nice move to get people interested but more can be done game pass is good it’s fact but please don’t just focalise on that in certain way it’s limiting the quality of games I mean launching a game not finished to player just because I can play for 10 dollars on game pass is not the way to go please take your time when making your games quality is what we need we hope for more physical release of games and eager for the June showcase I really hope the best for Xbox and the development teams sincerely