The Ascent Had Record Sales Success Despite Launching On Game Pass

Publisher Curve has announced that The Ascent earned more than $5 million in sales on its opening weekend. Developed by the Swedish indie studio Neon Giant, The Ascent launched on PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S, with the game also being available as part of the Game Pass subscription service on PC, console, and cloud.

Curve added that The Ascent rose to the top of Steam's global charts, while coverage of the game on YouTube and Twitch generated more than 10 million views.

"The Ascent is the first game out of Curve where our new team has been able to substantially make their mark, working closely with the developer and our platform partners," Curve CEO John Clark said in a press statement. "This success is the result of a genuine team effort throughout the company, the arrival of new leadership and talent, and is truly reflective of our new approach of being developer and player-focused in all that we do."

Curve added that positive word-of-mouth from gamers interested in the title--which blends cyberpunk themes with twin-stick shooter action and RPG elements--helped build awareness in the run-up to The Ascent's launch weekend. It's also possible that launching on Game Pass in fact helped sales, despite conventional thinking that might suggest otherwise.

While the game has received plenty of positive critical reception, its grand design has been missing ray-tracing and DLSS features on the PC Game Pass version, which Neon Giant says that it currently working to fix alongside other lingering bugs.