Narrative RPG 1000xStamina became a critical favorite when it launched in May 2024, but like so many other great indie games, it didn't receive its flowers at The Game Awards in December. But buzz has been building around the game since the TGA nominees were announced, according to 斜陽過客 founder and creative director Remy Siu. Now, Siu reports that the game's biggest sales day of all time was January 2, 2025, almost exactly seven months after its release.
Mainly, Siu says, the rumors are due to anger at the electoral apparatus for excluding the title from nominations.
“I was on a plane coming home (after being on vacation for the first time in four years) and bought the Internet on the plane to watch the Game Award nomination announcements. Unfortunately we were not nominated for anything. I was a little sad, but I thought yeah, it makes sense, we're a little experimental game,” Siu told me in a Bluesky message. “But almost immediately after the announcements, people started posting that they were upset that we weren't included.”
Siu said the game's “break-out rate,” also known as its sales rate under normal conditions, increased slightly after those nominations, which were announced in August. A series of fall sales throughout September, October and November meant more wishlists and more purchases, and Siu said The Game Awards on December 12 started another reactionary conversation about the game. The last domino to fall? The game's victory for Narrative Game at the first Indie Game Awards.
“Sales numbers were not low before January 1,” Siu said, clarifying that developers expected fewer sales overall by that time. “We must remember that 1000xRESISTANCE “It's a strange, experimental narrative game without traditional gameplay that talks about things that most games don't talk about, and we also wanted to keep a lot of things secret.”
Siu said the game's release and reception trajectory has taught him about the value of post-launch marketing, but that mishap may have been worth the risk of keeping the game's secrets, well, under wraps. “I think we always knew that if we could create a compelling enough experience, it would all come down to word of mouth. That people would have to discover it over time,” he said. And that's exactly what happened.
It's an unlikely but encouraging success story that underscores the power of the indie community and decentralized forms of marketing such as word of mouth, despite Siu's assertion that “the indie game distribution apparatus is not always well prepared to make this type of experience possible, from what I can tell.”
Siu attributes the game's recent surge in sales to several factors: the timing of the industry's shift to Bluesky, Steam deals and giveaway collaborations with other indie developers, mentions on best-of-the-year lists like ours, and collaborations. with other games like Balatro. But, Siu theorized, not being at The Game Awards and the reaction it generated from fans who really understood the game was an unexpected blessing.
“I hope word of mouth continues to allow more people to discover the game,” Siu said. “I think there's enough evidence now that it's actually working and allowing us to make more games in the future.”