Deep Rock Galactic sold millions of copies last year, and I reckon its wholesome community is to blame

What can I say? The people have spoken and they love dwarves. A week and a bit after Bay 12 shared news of bumper Dwarf Fortress sales figures, Ghost Ship Games has come out and said that Deep Rock Galactic sold an impressive 2 million copies in 2022 alone. What is it with gamers, dwarves, and mining?

That's not to say I'm surprised. Deep Rock Galactic is a darn fine game, and boasts one of the few consistently chill player communities on the entire internet. In fact, the game's burly ore-mongers have most recently spent their time rolling out an incredibly welcoming red carpet to fans of the Hololive VTuber Shishiro Botan (via GamesRadar). Call me cynical, but I wouldn't generally expect the Venn diagram of 'anime catgirl fans' and 'grizzled dwarf mining game players' to have much overlap, and yet the community came out in droves to greet Botan's fans, and even whipped up some wholesome memes to mark the occasion.

The Hololive community took note of how welcoming DRG players had been. Commenters on a much-upvoted Reddit post highlighting the fanbase crossover were delighted by how warm their reception had been. "DRG is legitimately one of the best gaming communities I've ever interacted with," wrote AsaTJ, "They're so upbeat and enthusiastic and welcoming." Another, H4LF4D, said "I swear the community itself made me wanna try the game."

Shishiro Botan's recent stream isn't why Deep Rock sold so many copies last year, though. The co-op FPS has been selling gangbusters for years. But I do think having a reliably welcoming, non-judgmental community is crucial for keeping players hooked and, crucially, talking a game up to their friends. Regardless, even if the community had nothing to do with it and people were just flocking to Deep Rock for its highly-customisable beards, it's just good to see some measure of kindness finding success in the world.

We rather enjoyed the game ourselves when we reviewed it all the way back in 2020. Phil Iwaniuk scored it 79% in his Deep Rock Galactic review, highlighting its thoughtful "asymmetrical class-based co-op," but noting that a lot of a player's experience relies on how well they're "watching and, most importantly, learning from better players." I have to imagine the community's positive vibe helps with that one.

If you're curious, you can check out Ghost Ship's full range of weird and wonderful Deep Rock Galactic stats right here. Judging by the number of falling deaths, it sounds like someone should install some safety rails over there.