Combining Statistical Information On Popularity (aka I love charts)

[Morrus]

So we have a selection of different measurement methods of trying to determine which games are the most sold, played, or discussed. Which games, in short, are the most popular? Now, of course, it doesn't matter whether one's favourite game is more popular than someone else's, but it's still a subject about which it's natural to be curious. And, of course, sales figures - the truest indication of commercial popularity, at least - are the one piece of information we'll never see.

The lines of evidence we have are as follows:

- ICV2's quarterly retailer surveys (sales in hobby game stores)
- Roll20's quarterly player report (games played on their Virtual Table Top)
- Fantasy Grounds' quarterly player report (games played on their Virtual Table Top)
- EN World's Hot Games Chart (games mentioned in a real-time monitoring of over 1,00 sites, blogs, and forums)

On a secondary level:

- Patrons of EN5ider and TRAILseeker (who subscribes to two equally promoted publications)
- ENnies wins (not yet available)

Other things I haven't checked but would be relevant:

- Amazon sales charts

On their own, none of these are conclusive. However, I like compiling things, and I like charts. Let's take a look at those figures for a few popular systems. For convenience, I have taken the last quarters top five from ICv2 as my list. I also added Savage Worlds, as it features strongly on some of the other lists.

[TABLE="width: 100%"] [TR] [TD]Measure
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]D&D 5E
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]Pathfinder
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]Star Wars
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]Numenera
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]Fate
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]Savage Worlds
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]ICv2
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]1
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]2
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]3
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]4
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]5
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]-
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Roll20*
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]27.38%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]20.55%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]2.67%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]0.84%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]1.54%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]1.62%
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Fantasy Grounds
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]38%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]19%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]2%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]<1%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]<1%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]6%
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Hot Games Chart
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]27.42%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]9.93%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]0.07%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]0.96%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]6.91%
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]3.16%
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Patrons
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]713
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]139
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]-
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]-
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]-
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]-
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Total (% only)
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]92.8
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]49.48
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]4.74
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]2.8
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]9.45
[/TD] [TD="align: center"]10.78
[/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE]

*This lists two figures: Players and Games. I used Games, as it's the first listed, but feel free to check out the Players stat too.
​

It's interesting how - after D&D and Pathfinder - the others all jockey around for position. There appears to be a large gap between those two and the rest of the list, with even strong brand names like Star Wars falling in the latter portion. So we have two flavours of D&D at the top by a clear margin. Even more so if you check out those links, and see other D&D editions up there, too. I suspect that those two games will exchange positions over the coming years, but will continue to dominate the top of most lists.

Total %ages added together: