Steam is the main storefront for game distribution on PC. Bohemia Interactive looks back at its debut on the platform 15 years ago, revealing how many copies of its games it has sold since then.
Arma 2
Bohemia Interactive CEO Marek Spanel shared the data in a post on X, saying that Arma 2 sold 174 copies in its first 24 hours after launching on Steam in June 2009.
At the time, Valve’s store was much smaller in terms of user base. There is no official data on the growth of daily active users over the years, but Steam had a peak CUU of 1.92 million in June 2009 compared to a recent record of 38.3 million concurrent users.
According to SteamDB, less than 400 games launched on Steam in 2009. For comparison, there were over 14k new releases on the platform last year, and over 14.5k titles have already been released in 2024 so far.
So Bohemia Interactive was one of the first developers to take the step towards PC digital distribution. More than 15 years after its debut on the platform, the Czech studio has sold tens of millions of units across its entire game catalog on Valve’s store:
- 47.2 million units sold, including keys purchased outside of Steam;
- 40.9 million copies purchased directly via Steam.
“I want to shoutout [Valve] for creating a platform that connects developers with players worldwide. Here’s to the power of digital distribution!” Spanel wrote.
On June 1st, 2009, our first day on the platform, we sold our first 174 copies of Arma 2 on @Steam. 🎮
Fifteen years later, I want to shoutout @valvesoftware for creating a platform that connects developers with players worldwide. Here’s to the power of digital distribution! 🚀… pic.twitter.com/ySpOkWdC4K
— Marek Spanel (@maruksp) October 19, 2024
As of February 2015, Arma 2 has sold over 2.3 million copies globally. DayZ, which started as a community mod to the game, has evolved into a successful standalone product. Spanel recently revealed that it has averaged over 400k daily active users over the past 30 days.
Arma 3 remains one of the Bohemia’s biggest games. In 2023, it surpassed 10 million units sold globally, with various DLC and expansions adding another 11 million.