March 28, 2025 by Rhys Elliott

How well have Xbox games on PlayStation been selling so far? It differs

It’s undeniable: Xbox is now a third-party publisher. Games that would have once been siloed on Xbox consoles are now on Steam and even PlayStation.

This is fantastic for gamers (more people can enjoy Xbox games) and Xbox devs (their art reaches more people). But it’s also great – no, critical – for Xbox. The brand has frankly been struggling on the console front due to stagnating Xbox Game Pass numbers.

Xbox’s plan was always to shift from a box to a brand, and we’re almost there. More and more Xbox games are coming to PlayStation, including some big ones next month with Forza Horizon and Indiana Jones.

But how well are the already-released Xbox ports doing on PlayStation? While Xbox games have dominated PlayStation charts at launch, the actual numbers have been a black box. Until now.

In this article, our best-in-class methodology for copies sold across PlayStation and Steam finally sheds light on how Xbox games are doing on other platforms

The ports (no pun intended) of Sea of Thieves and Grounded have been big sellers and resulted in significant revenues for Xbox

Let’s take a look at the big hitters first (we’ll analyse the smaller games later):

• Sea of Thieves, Rare’s co-op pirate romp that came to Xbox and PC in 2018 and hit PlayStation in April 2024, selling 1.8 million copies on PlayStation so far
• Grounded, Obsidian’s co-op survival game that launched on Xbox and PC in 2020 and came to PlayStation in April 2024, selling 432.2K on PlayStation so far

Using Steam copies sold as a comparison, we can see that PlayStation players – in terms of actual numbers and relatively speaking – are more drawn to Sea of Thieves.

Sea of Thieves has sold just over seven times as many copies on Steam versus PlayStation, while Grounded has sold about nine times as many on Steam.

On that note, Grounded recently exceeded $100 million in revenues on Steam, so we’d say Xbox’s off-platform experiments have been worth it so far.

In general, there does not appear to be a huge cohort of PlayStation players who have checked out multiple Xbox games so far, as just 8.1% of Sea of Thieves players on PlayStation have also played Grounded on PlayStation. But the cohort exists.

The fact that 29% of Grounded players on PlayStation have also played Sea of Thieves on the platform does suggest a group of Xbox-curious PlayStation players.

This makes sense. Many console gamers switched from the Xbox 360 to the PS4 due to Xbox’s eyebrow-raising choices in the Xbox One era.

These metrics bode well for the imminent releases of Forza and probably Gears and Halo on PlayStation. PlayStation gamers (especially lapsed Xbox ones) have been dying to get their hands (back) on these franchises.

So Xbox is on track to make some major money on PlayStation consoles and can reach the (European) console gamers it’s been missing out on for a decade now.

Sea of Thieves, a niche franchise compared to Xbox’s big guns is the canary (parrot!?) in the coalmine. There are bigger things on the horizon (no more pirate puns – promise).

It’s cooperative experiences (and a pirate’s life – sorry…) for Sea of Thieves players on PlayStation

As we boast the most comprehensive and accurate PlayStation data on the market (don’t believe us? We’ll show you), we thought we’d zoom in on what else Sea of Thieves players on PlayStation have been playing.

We found some interesting over-indexing, beyond the usual suspects like Red Dead Redemption, Fortnite, and God of War:

As you can see, games with a cooperative spin – like Dead by Daylight, Destiny 2, Among Us, and It Takes Two – are massive with Sea of Thieves players on PlayStation. A least a third has played each of these games, and almost half have played Dead by Daylight or Destiny 2.

This makes sense, as Sea of Thieves is a design masterclass in co-op games, weaving asymmetrical co-op mechanics, social tools, and dynamic systems into an experience with teamwork, creativity, and shared storytelling.

Of course, there are other factors at play in the crossover.

Among Us is a cheaper game, Destiny 2 is free to play, and Dead by Daylight and It Takes Two have been included with PlayStation Plus subscriptions (and Among Us, actually). But Sea of Thieves players on PlayStation still over-index as players of these other titles.

What’s more, a third of Sea of Thieves PS players have played co-op hit Helldivers 2, which is paid, has not come to PlayStation Plus yet, and whose price has not dropped below $30 yet (as shown by Alinea data).

Reach out if you want to see just how many more copies Helldivers 2 sells when it goes on sale.

Finally, our Sea of Thieves data on PlayStation also shows a cohort of players who are drawn to pirate-themed games in general, as over a fifth have also played Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag.

Even more tellingly, 12.9% played Ubisoft’s newer, but sadly dead-on-the-water pirate sim Skull & Bones.

How is Assassin’s Creed Shadows doing? Get some free data here.

More niche Xbox games haven’t sold as well on PlayStation, but they are still worth it

Xbox has also ported some more niche exclusives to PlayStation more recently. As our methodology goes beyond what’s out there in the market, we are happy to give our estimates on even these smaller games. For example:

• Hi-Fi Rush, a rhythm-based platformer-action game, which came to Xbox and PC in 2023 and PlayStation in March 2024, selling 137.2K on PlayStation so far
• Pentiment, a historical adventure game from Obsidian that came to Xbox and PC in 2022 and to PlayStation in February 2024, selling 14K on PlayStation
• Age of Mythology Retold, a remake of a classic RTS, came to Xbox and PC in September 2024 and PS5 last month, selling 41.K on PlayStation so far

As you can see, PlayStation players are more drawn to Hi-Fi Rush, which had around five times as many sales on Steam versus PlayStation, compared to ten times more on Steam for Age of Mythology and eighteen times for Pentiment.

Of course, Hi-Fi Rush’s better performance is no surprise. Those other two games are RTS/adventure games, two iconically PC genres. Meanwhile, 3D platformers and consoles go hand in hand.

While Nintendo is the undisputed market leader for 3D platformers (over 30 million sold for Mario Odyssey!), PlayStation’s own Astro Bot was released last year to rave reviews and even won game of the year at The Game Awards.

How many copies has Astro sold? Find out here.

Xbox’s PlayStation experiments so far are just the beginning – the biggest are yet to come

Xbox’s strategic experiments with PlayStation ports, even seemingly commercially underperforming ones, are a calculated long-term play.

They offer invaluable insights into cross-platform development pipelines, player behaviour on other ecosystems, and the nuances of optimising games for hardware with distinct architectures.

Every port, successful or not, sharpens the technical of expertise Xbox’s studios and talent.

Xbox has just been testing the waters so far, refining its cross-platform strategy ahead of larger, more consequential releases. The inevitable launches of marquee IP like Gears of War or Halo on PlayStation were once unthinkable, but now they’re a certainty.

While some corners of the internet argue that the move dilutes Xbox’s appeal, the long-term upside of Xbox as a third party is clear.

Decoupling flagship IP from console exclusivity lets Xbox tap into PlayStation’s massive install base to fund development cycles, subsidise Game Pass’ user saturation, and reach the masses.

Xbox’s hardware will remain a premium entry point for Game Pass and ecosystem integration, much like how Steam coexists with third-party PC vendors. The endgame is a future where Xbox thrives not by “winning” the console war, but by taking the dominant software provider across all platforms.

The result is a diversified revenue portfolio: hardware revenues and subscription recurring revenue from loyalists, supplemented by a cut of full-game sales on ‘’rival’’ stores. But Xbox as a console is dead – or at least dying, and is poised to be replaced by something more PC-like – as per reliable Xbox insider Jez Corden.

Over time, this strategy could position Xbox as the industry’s most resilient ecosystem, untethered from the risks of single-platform dependency.

Everything going on with Xbox right now shows that it is aiming to become the “Windows of gaming”, a universal layer underpinning play everywhere – portably, at home, and on every screen.

Whether or not that lofty long-term plan plays out remains to be seen. But we already see the seeds, and will be watching next month’s PlayStation ports of Forza Horizon 5 and Indiana Jones very closely.

Watch along with us on our platform, or follow Alinea on LinkedIn to get the high-level insights.