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Playstation Reveals Interactive Map for 2023 Top 3 Most Played Games in Total Hours in Specific Countries

Ryuichi Naruhodo

Ryuichi Naruhodo

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Rankings are based on total hours played across PlayStation®4 and PlayStation®5 consoles between 1st January 2023 and 30th November 2023.

Top 3 Played Games Per Each Country Covered in the Map
ARGENTINA
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Rocket League
AUSTRALIA
  1. Fortnite
  2. Call of Duty®
  3. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
BRAZIL
  1. EA Sports FIFA 23
  2. Fortnite
  3. Grand Theft Auto V
CANADA
  1. Fortnite
  2. Call of Duty®
  3. Grand Theft Auto V
COLOMBIA
  1. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  2. Fortnite
  3. Call of Duty®
FINLAND
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
FRANCE
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
GERMANY
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
IRELAND
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
ITALY
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Grand Theft Auto V
JAPAN
  1. Apex Legends
  2. Genshin Impact
  3. Fortnite
MEXICO
  1. Fortnite
  2. Call of Duty®
  3. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
NETHERLANDS
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
NEW ZEALAND
  1. Fortnite
  2. Grand Theft Auto V
  3. Call of Duty®
POLAND
  1. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  2. Fortnite
  3. Grand Theft Auto V
Saudi Arabia
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Grand Theft Auto V
SOUTH AFRICA
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
SOUTH KOREA
  1. Diablo IV
  2. EA Sports FIFA 23
  3. Elden Ring
SPAIN
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
SWEDEN
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
  1. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  2. Fortnite
  3. Grand Theft Auto V
UNITED KINGDOM
  1. Fortnite
  2. EA SPORTS FIFA 23
  3. Call of Duty®
UNITED STATES
  1. Fortnite
  2. Call of Duty®
  3. Grand Theft Auto V

https://www.playstation.com/en-us/editorial/this-month-on-playstation/ultimate-review-of-the-year/
 
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Fortnite : 22 times
EA Sports FIFA 23 : 19
Call Of Duty : 15
Grand Theft Auto V : 8

Apex Legends : 1
Elden Ring : 1
Diablo IV : 1
Genshin Impact : 1
Rocket League : 1
 
I'm consistently surprised by the prevalence of similar gaming preferences among PlayStation users, typically centered around games like COD and FIFA. The potential impact of COD not being available on PlayStation might be more significant than initially anticipated. Reflecting on 2021, when individuals paid exorbitant prices to scalpers for a PS5, many of those buyers ultimately acquired the console primarily for playing FIFA and COD, especially here in Europe.
 
This metric heavily favors games that can be played consistently over the year. I play 2-3 hours of FIFA every week. So FiFA is regularly my most played game of the year (only this year topped by BG3).
But between BG3, FFXVI and AC6 alone I spent over 300 hours with SP-games. Which single player games can be played for over 100 hours, besides Persona or Monster Hunter (and there’s CO-OP)?
So I find these stats not irregular and it doesn’t even tell us how much and which SP-games are appreciated.
 
Xbox wouldn't be much different

With Switch lacking a couple of these games, and Nintendo being so dominant, wonder how it would play out there.

In any case, all these are games you can put in a couple hours into and just have a good time, so it makes sense
 
ILikeFeet said:
With Switch lacking a couple of these games, and Nintendo being so dominant, wonder how it would play out there.
Click to expand...
#1 in almost all countries : Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

ILikeFeet said:
In any case, all these are games you can put in a couple hours into and just have a good time, so it makes sense
Click to expand...

I do believe we've had some player retention numbers from the PlayStation leak and a bunch of players play big SP titles for like 8-10 hours and drop it. In the multiplayer space, that's barely enough time to get really get a grip on to how the game plays. It's really no surprise how some of these big franchises are at the top.


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In general, the only atypical countries are Japan with Apex at #1 and South Korea.

Diablo IV being #1 in SK on PlayStation is not a surprise considering Diablo 2 is still very popular in the land of PC gaming(let us not forget Starcraft: Brood War).
Elden Ring at #3 is a bit more surprising, but again, soulslike are pretty popular in South Korea as well.

Also none of South Korea's top three titles are F2P.
 
meatbag said:
I believe South Korea is heavily into PC so that may be where the F2P gamers are at
Click to expand...

South Korea is heavily into LoL*
But yes, Korea is a heavily PC/Mobile country, it is also heavily a Blizzard country as well.
Diablo, Starcraft BW and Overwatch are still played a decent amount relative to other countries.
Even though the last two have dropped off in recent years. When it comes to the latter, it's pretty much Blizzard's fault.
 
It seems Japan is the only country with the F2P games at the top three.

That explains why PS5 softwares sales aren't aligned with hardware sales in Japan.
 
Himura Kenshin said:
Also Japan having Genshin Impact at No. 2. The only time Apex Legend and Genshin Impact appear on any country's lists, yet for Japan they're No. 1 and 2.

Unique as well the third game is Fortnite, so only country with an all F2P top 3.
Click to expand...

Genshin Impact's ranking in China on PlayStation : #1, #2 and #3
 
Korea having three paid games makes me think its... very low user base. Easier to swing statistics that way to get a result like that unless Elden Ring is like some cultural phenomenon in Korea.

Japan being f2p is not remotely surprising, though I am actually surprised at APEX being the #1.

Aside from that, not really shocked at the general Top 3 across the board.
 
No surprises, Fortnite is absolutely massive, CoD is huge for more than a decade and football (soccer) is the most popular sport in the world.
 
That is why i can't understand all the hate Sony gets for wanting to pivot to GAAS games. Sure i don't play GAAS myself and love single players game but its obvious that for most gamers GAAS games are dominant over single player games. So i'm sad to be in the minority but logical that video game companies pivot to the gaming majority even if their preferenses are different than my own.
 
Danny said:
That is why i can't understand all the hate Sony gets for wanting to pivot to GAAS games. Sure i don't play GAAS myself and love single players game but its obvious that for most gamers GAAS games are dominant over single player games. So i'm sad to be in the minority but logical that video game companies pivot to the gaming majority even if their preferenses are different than my own.
Click to expand...
The problem is GAAS is not very sustainable outside of the big series. We're seeing those games close up shop all the time.
 
Danny said:
That is why i can't understand all the hate Sony gets for wanting to pivot to GAAS games. Sure i don't play GAAS myself and love single players game but its obvious that for most gamers GAAS games are dominant over single player games. So i'm sad to be in the minority but logical that video game companies pivot to the gaming majority even if their preferenses are different than my own.
Click to expand...
The issue isn't that people dont play GAAS games, it's that most people play the same GAAS games and are extremely unlikely to deviate to playing other GAAS games (such as the ones Sony is purportedly working on).
 
So Fortnite, Fifa and pick a game between CoD and GTAV.
South Korea and Japan are the two markets that most differs (though in the latter case by having other F2P games).
Overall pretty boring.
 
Exclusives still matter as even with cross play people want to be on the same ecosystem as their friends so whilst the top three games might be F2P cross platform games, if your group has people drawn to a platform for specific games then that becomes everyone’s platform of choice.

I do think there’s an opportunity to compete on price though. Series S is probably helping Xbox a lot in what otherwise would have been a poor start to the generation. I wonder how a mid tier platform would perform with one SKU, I.e. no Series X or S but something in between unashamedly competing on price.
 
Exclusives are a differentiator and can help sway a purchase but what really drives mass userbase (on PS/Xbox at least) are primarily these giant 3rd party multiplats. They are vital, 1st party exclusives (or moneyhatted 3rd party exclusives) significantly less so.
 
awng782 said:
The issue isn't that people dont play GAAS games, it's that most people play the same GAAS games and are extremely unlikely to deviate to playing other GAAS games (such as the ones Sony is purportedly working on).
Click to expand...

I don’t really think this is true. There really aren’t a lot of big and unique new multiplayer games dropping that often. The stuff that gets shut down really fast are always from smaller developers.

The Finals is still averaging 100k players a day and its didn’t even launch to amazing reviews. I think people in these sorts of spaces tend to have blind spots for multiplayer if it’s not constantly talked about everyday. There are tons of successful multiplayer that aren’t in the top 5
 
1 million Playstation users only play CoD and about 6 million Playstation users spend a minimum of 70 % of their playtime on Cod:

As reported by The Verge, Ryan also says that about 6 million PlayStation gamers spent more than 70% of their gaming time playing just Call of Duty.
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kotaku.com

1 Million PlayStation Owners Play Call Of Duty... And Nothing Else

Poorly redacted data from the Activision FTC hearings shows millions mainly play the popular shooter
kotaku.com kotaku.com

So had CoD abandoned Playstation millions of Playstation gamers would probably jump ship from Playstation to Xbox or PC gamepass. No wonder Ryan was nervous.
 
Danny said:
1 million Playstation users only play CoD and about 6 million Playstation users spend a minimum of 70 % of their playtime on Cod:



kotaku.com

1 Million PlayStation Owners Play Call Of Duty... And Nothing Else

Poorly redacted data from the Activision FTC hearings shows millions mainly play the popular shooter
kotaku.com kotaku.com

So had CoD abandoned Playstation millions of Playstation gamers would probably jump ship from Playstation to Xbox or PC gamepass. No wonder Ryan was nervous.
Click to expand...

It’s very likely that CoD sales would also tank. If Microsoft would have been confident in a 100% attrition rate of playstation users they would have fought harder against at 10 year CoD deal
 
ILikeFeet said:
With Switch lacking a couple of these games, and Nintendo being so dominant, wonder how it would play out there.
Click to expand...

theprodigy said:
1. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
2/3. Super Smash Bros Ultimate/Fortnite

there :p
Click to expand...

Astral_lion02 said:
Even on Switch Fortnite would have been #1 almost everywhere.

And Minecraft would have been in the top 3 in a lot of places too.
Click to expand...

A couple of years ago, Nintendo actually put a "most-played" section in the eShop and it was heavily single-player games - the top played title then was Disgaea 6. Unfortunately, that section was shut down not long after.
 
Duarte Pacheco said:
A couple of years ago, Nintendo actually put a "most-played" section in the eShop and it was heavily single-player games - the top played title then was Disgaea 6. Unfortunately, that section was shut down not long after.
Click to expand...
I have a 2023 most played games section in the Austrian/German eShop. But it is not numbered.
The list from top to bottom is:
Fortnite
Zelda TotK
Minecraft
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
Animal Crossing
SMB Wonder
Pokemon Scarlet
Pokemon Violet
Rocket League
Fall Guys
Super Mario Odyssey
Smash Bros.
Hogwarts Legacy
EA Sports FC 24
New SMB U Deluxe
Pokemon Unite
Switch Sports
Splatoon 3
Mario Party Superstars
Super Mario 3D World + Bowser‘s Fury
Disney Dreamlight Valley
 
Danny said:
That is why i can't understand all the hate Sony gets for wanting to pivot to GAAS games. Sure i don't play GAAS myself and love single players game but its obvious that for most gamers GAAS games are dominant over single player games. So i'm sad to be in the minority but logical that video game companies pivot to the gaming majority even if their preferenses are different than my own.
Click to expand...
I don't hate Sony for trying something outside their MO, but to me this is another illustration for how hard it will be for anything that's not an established juggernaut to break through. There's a reason Sega killed one of their nearly completed projects after pouring millions into it, and Sony's ND also bailed after years of development.
 
Apex Legends has really lost a ton of steam since its peak in 2019–21. I don't think it can survive another 5 years, which EA had initially planned for.

It's such a shame that EA never provided Respawn with ample resources to deliver new content at a sufficient pace, especially compared to its main competitor, Fortnite. The content droughts in Apex are probably the worst for any modern F2P service game.

Nonetheless, Apex Legends will always be my favourite shooter of all time.
 
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then you wonder why Sony is making 12 GAAS games

Sony even knows most of these 12 will fail but if they can get 1 or 2 that can sustain themselves
 
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