HL Source mod generates $3m; Valve reveals retail sales numbers

by Ross Miller { Dec 3rd 2008 at 1:30PM }

Half-Life application Garry's Mod celebrated its two-year anniversary of being on Steam last week. On his blog, creator Garry Newman celebrated by divulging the sales figures of the software so far on Steam: 312,541 copies. At about $10 per copy, that amounts to over $3 million. Not too shabby for the 26-year old English developer -- even if Valve takes a piece of the pie. Maybe now he can make a suit of money.

Speaking of Valve, who as a general rule is very secretive with its sales figures (especially regarding Steam), the company has released its worldwide lifetime-to-date retail sales (via Gamasutra). Pre-Steam release Half-Life is on top at 9.3 million, followed by Half-Life 2 at 6.5m and Counter-Strike at 4.2m. These figures don't include Steam sales, which CEO Gabe Newell has said he expects to typically surpass retail sales. Full list after the break.

Half-Life: 9.3 million units
Half-Life 2: 6.5 million units
Counter-Strike: 4.2 million units
The Orange Box: 3 million units
Counter-Strike Condition Zero: 2.9 million units
Counter-Strike Source: 2.1 million units
Half-Life 2 Episode 1: 1.4 million units
Half-Life Opposing Force: 1.1 million units
Half-Life Blue Shift: 800,000 units

[Via Big Download]

Source - GMod10 is 2 years old today! [Garry's Blog]
Source - Valve's Lifetime Retail Sales [Gamasutra]

Tags: garrys-mod, half-life, half-life-2, mods, steam, valve

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

WiNG LifeInAGame.com @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:36PM

Steam is friggin' awesome.

kelder @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:39PM

Thats surprising.I know steam is the pc darling but i never thought that valve had sold that meny games,especialy as thats only retail and not steam's as well.

JerJer @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:51PM

"but i never thought that valve had sold that meny games"

...

really??? it never crossed your mind that valve's three critically and commercially acclaimed superstars would sell that many?

kelder @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:08PM

No not really.I had though a couple mil for each major game,hl and hl2, and one to one and a half mil for the expansions,hl2 ep1-2 tf2.Its proberly all the articals about pc gaming dying that turn up or the quotes for devs

Zeus.:God @ Dec 3rd 2008 6:30PM

Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike: Blue Shift, Counter-Strike: Source, Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episode 1, Half-Life 2: Episode 2, Portal, Team Fortress 2 (TF1 was a mode for CS), is just a portion of what VALVe has released (and sold millions of).

Archon @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:41PM

I remember everyone hated Steam a few years back. Never used it, so... what changed your mind about the service?

Haggard @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:42PM

It stopped being broken.

Archon @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:43PM

Oh, ok.

Psycho300x @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:45PM

yeah, it stopped crapping itself to death every time a big release came out (like it did when HL2 came out)

feffrey @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:32PM

For me it got good once I got DSl, Dial up and steam = epic failure.

chispito @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:43PM

It wasn't perfect when it came out but I don't remember hating it. I just didn't buy games off it right away.

t_m @ Dec 3rd 2008 10:36PM

broadband.

Psycho300x @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:44PM

didnt all retail versions of HL2 ship with CSS? so shouldnt they be even? I dont know because I found a copy of the collectors edition a year after the game came out :) (for cheap too)

Naota @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:50PM

on that note, you'd imagine that HL2 episode 1 would also be higher since it's bundled, but this is probably just stand alone sales.

Zeus.:God @ Dec 3rd 2008 7:09PM

Only the Game of the Year Edition of Half-Life 2 came with CS:S... Which also included the previous game.

DangerMouse @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:58PM

That's nuts. Very few companies can sell a few million copies of a game and receive 100% of the revenue. Not to mention getting a cut on every one of the hundreds of games being sold on steam already. Very impressive for a small-medium size business. Also, they're not a publicly traded company, so their focus is on the gamers, not stock holders. Valve's a real win for the gamers.

Meta @ Dec 3rd 2008 3:03PM

I thought they went incorporated a few years back. Or is that just wikipedia lying to me?

E.J. @ Dec 3rd 2008 3:57PM

These sales figures are amazing considering the fact that HL, HL2, and CS are/were pirated so much since they are so fun to play.

Good job, Valve!

DangerMouse @ Dec 3rd 2008 4:24PM

I believe they're incorporated, but privately held instead of being public.

Meta @ Dec 3rd 2008 6:27PM

Ah, ok.

JerJer @ Dec 3rd 2008 7:41PM

speaking of the pirating issue..

does this finally prove that most pc gamers wont pirate if the game is AMAZING??

there was rampant LAM pirating/trading of the original half life and it STILL sold 9 mil + HARD COPIES. that's NASTY!!!

capt_carl @ Dec 3rd 2008 1:59PM

I've been a Steam member since Steam was launched, November 2003. It was horrible back then. The Half Life 2 launch was atrocious. Amazing to see what the service has become now.

I've thought about buying Garry's mod several times, but it's not really something I've needed. I may rethink that...

Danny F. @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:09PM

Same here, at first it was a nightmare to use but once the bugs were worked out overtime it became a awesome form of getting games. Getting Crysis / Warhead was a breeze and worked perfectly when I started using it again.

As for Garrys Mod its a awesome mod to get if you ever want something to kill time with or your feeling constructive. The possibilities with it is really endless. I used to spend hours just goofing around with it every day. Now I just try it out every other week or so, but was definitely worth the $10.00 price tag.

chispito @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:53PM

See, I don't remember thinking the HL2 launch was atrocious at all. Bumpy, maybe, but nothing like what an MMO experiences at launch. I had the game pre-loaded and ready to go and it was activated on launch day and I played it. I had already been playing the CSS beta for awhile, and didn't notice any particular problems with that game, either.

Einhanderkiller @ Dec 3rd 2008 5:36PM

Yeah, it seems like I was one of the few lucky ones. The game played smoothly and I wasn't hit with any activation issues. The game played fine on my 2.53 GHz Pentium 4 with 384 MB of RAM and a GeForce 4 MX 420.

Bass Masterson @ Dec 3rd 2008 6:40PM

You just pointed out one of the many reasons I hate Steam. Having a direct pipeline into your home lets them release buggy crap at full price, then slowly patch it up into usability.

But keep drinking that Kool-Aid.

chispito @ Dec 4th 2008 1:03AM

I have no idea what you're talking about, Bass.

HL2 was plenty stable at launch, as was CSS (from my experience). Sure occasional bugs pop up but they aren't game breaking. And what's even better is that Valve uses that "direct pipeline" to continue refining and tweaking their games, releasing brand new (free) content, like they've been doing with TF2.

343 Guilty Fart @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:03PM

Here in my car
I feel safest of all
I can lock all my doors
It's the only way to live
In cars

Zeus.:God @ Dec 3rd 2008 8:08PM

God, I love Fear Factory.

pasta @ Dec 4th 2008 7:25AM

Funny you should say that Zeus, it was actually Gary Numan who did Cars, Fear Factory just covered it. (source: http://www.coversproject.com/artist/gary%20numan/#song_866_cars )

Dirty @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:10PM

Wish that quote bubble said " The penis mightier for 300".

Levi @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:22PM

Suck it Trebek. Suck it long, and suck it hard.

xGeneral DEATHx (Mr ESC Welcome Back Party Ultimate Mega Action Force) @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:47PM

Buck Futter!

Shagittarius @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:51PM

0 + 0 - 0 = 0

capt_carl @ Dec 3rd 2008 3:04PM

I'm the cock of the walk!

The Dark Wayne @ Dec 3rd 2008 4:32PM

Mooo
No Mr. Connery that is not the answer
Well that's the sound your mother made last night

jumpshot @ Dec 3rd 2008 4:37PM

I'll take "the rapists" for 200 Alex

Levi @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:27PM

Steam still sucks for me. A friend of mine gifted HL2 and Ep. 1, and I can't get either of them to work on my PC. This kind of crap makes it hard for me to want to get into PC gaming.

Levi @ Dec 3rd 2008 5:33PM

...well, it's true. I tried to get it to work, but I was unsatisfied with Valve's level of support.

BTW, does anybody want me to gift them a copy of HL2 since I can't play it?

And what the hell? This was supposed to be a comment for Archon up above. This is the second time today that I did this. No more Red Bulls for me today.

Deozaan @ Dec 4th 2008 3:24AM

I'll take you up on that offer. My Steam username is Deozaan.

FraGNeM @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:31PM

I'm making a note here: Huge Success.

LxgShaka @ Dec 3rd 2008 3:05PM

I have to say this... EPIC.. WIN

chispito @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:46PM

No. HL2 and CSS are separate products that were in several packages together, but unlike HL and CS, you do not automatically get the latter by purchasing the former.

CS was always essentially a free mod for HL, that Valve packaged separately and sold to the cheap or uninformed, who didn't purchase the ability to play both for $5-10 more.

Strategy_Panda (the artist formally known as Titanium_Orchid) @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:47PM

wow, 9.2 million for half-life one?

That means that 9.2 million units of HL1 were sold AFTER Half Life 2 was released.

Thats mega impressive.

FraGNeM @ Dec 3rd 2008 2:56PM

That would be impressive, and a little silly.

These are lifetime-to-date numbers, though, so that HL1 count should be the highest.

There was no Steam copy to count against its retail sales numbers, unlike the other big releases.

Strategy_Panda (the artist formally known as Titanium_Orchid) @ Dec 3rd 2008 3:05PM

oop, guess I should have read the article.

Burritoclock @ Dec 3rd 2008 3:00PM

Did every single one of you not read the post??? See the part about how this is NOT steam sales, and is in fact the complete opposite? This is sales EXCLUDING steam, RETAIL sales...

That is why Gary's Mod is not on the list at the end, it has no retail sales...

BigD145 @ Dec 3rd 2008 3:13PM

Let me see if I have this straight. Half-Life at full and discounted prices sells 9.3 million units before Steam. Half-Life on Steam sells for less than ever before, including the recent deal where it's almost free, and CEO X thinks Steam has sold more than 9.3 million units? He's the CEO and he doesn't know anything about his company. I'm convinced CEO's are paid to not think.