- 100-player tactical shooter Wardogs has become one of the biggest launches on Steam this year.
- The title has crossed 400k concurrent users, while selling over a million copies globally.
- The game is still in early access and will launch on consoles like the PS5 in 2028.
2026 has been a year to forget for multiplayer shooting titles. New AAA releases like Bungie’s Marathon have failed to make a sizeable impact, costing Sony a whopping $565 million in losses while losing 95% of its player base in just a few months.
Existing shooting games like Battlefield 6 have also failed to retain their initial popularity due to lackluster updates and an inability to pay attention to fan feedback. However, seven months into the year, a new FPS title has surprisingly become one of the biggest launches on Steam in 2026.
Why it matters: With several multiplayer titles failing to hit the ground running this year, it’s nice to see an FPS game from an indie studio do the numbers many expected from the likes of Marathon.
Indie title Wardogs, developed by British studio Bulkhead, has debuted with an incredible 400k concurrent players on Steam during its early access window. The multiplayer shooting title launched on 10th September to an impressive 337k players before surpassing this figure only two days later.
The demand for Wardogs even caught developers off guard, with the load on servers causing the game to crash after players had queued for hours to play it. Consequently, the user score dropped as low as 57% on Steam, falling into the mixed category as fans expressed their dissatisfaction with connectivity and server issues.
However, Wardogs rebounded in the next few days, and it currently sits at a respectable “mostly positive” rating of 78% on Steam. Bulkhead also announced that the 100-player First-person shooter sold 1.25 million copies in just 24 hours, despite the review bombing that ensued due to server issues.
Moreover, Wardogs has become the fourth most played title on Steam, only ranking below the likes of Dota 2 and Counter-Strike 2 on the platform. Hence, in a year when multiple AAA and indie shooters like Highguard and Marathon have failed to find a sizeable audience, the FPS game has carved out a successful niche for itself on Steam.
Do you think Wardogs deserves all the success it is getting? What did the game do differently compared to other lackluster first-person shooters? Tell us in the comments below or head to the Tech4Gamers forum for discussion.
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Shameer Sarfaraz has previously worked for eXputer as a Senior News Writer for several years. Now with Tech4Gamers, he loves to devoutly keep up with the latest gaming and entertainment industries. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science and years of experience reporting on games. Besides his passion for breaking news stories, Shahmeer loves spending his leisure time farming away in Stardew Valley. VGC, IGN, GameSpot, Game Rant, TheGamer, GamingBolt, The Verge, NME, Metro, Dot Esports, GameByte, Kotaku Australia, PC Gamer, and more have cited his articles.
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