Perfect World Entertainment and Cryptic Studios launched Neverwinter on Xbox One five weeks ago and while there isn't much in terms of competition it is now the most successful free-to-play title on the platform with a total of 1.6 million players.
· 2.3 million characters created with over 92,000 reaching the level 60 cap
· 86 million minutes of Neverwinter played
· 16 billion Astral Diamonds earned
· 10 million parties formed
· Over 1 billion enemies slain including Undead, Orcs and Bandits
· 92 players have killed over 1,000 dragons
"As our first entry into the console market, we're absolutely ecstatic to see the success of Neverwinter on Xbox One," said Bryan Huang, CEO for Perfect World Entertainment. "Our goal with our online games is to create worlds that players want to play in, and support them through fine tuning their gaming experience and introducing fresh content with expansion releases."
"As the first Xbox One game to ship globally from our partners at Perfect World Entertainment and Cryptic Studios, it is exciting to see Neverwinter achieve such early success," said Phil Spencer, Head of Xbox. "We're thrilled gamers have embraced this unique free-to-play MMORPG on Xbox One and look forward to seeing engagement grow on the platform with new content."
What Neverwinter shows us is that free-to-play is clearly viable, even if Xbox One doesn't have a massive install base just yet.