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Evolve enjoying more popularity on Steam since move to free-to-play

After measuring concurrent users in the low hundreds, Evolve now has over 25,000 players online at once.

David Craddock

July 8, 2016 4:09 PM

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Turtle Rock's decision to convert its Evolve shooter from premium to free-to-play on PC has resulted in a huge spike in popularity on Steam.

Steam's list of the top 100 games organized by active players shows Evolve: Stage 2—the free-to-play version of the game—at number 17 as of this writing (via GameSpot), with over 25,000 concurrent hunters and monsters duking it out. Turtle Rock's troubled asymmetric shooter, where four players control hunters out to bag a monster played by a fifth individual, hasn't enjoyed numbers that high since its launch in February 2015.

Just a few months ago, the game's active player count sunk like a stone into the low hundreds.

It's worth noting that as of right now, Evolve: Stage 2 is completely free-to-play, no strings attached. Turtle Rock thinks of this phase of its release as a beta test to measure player interest and assorted changes. The game can't remain devoid of microtransactions forever, though, as the developer obviously wants to resume making money on it sooner rather than later.

David Craddock

Long Reads Editor

David L. Craddock writes fiction, nonfiction, and grocery lists. He is the author of the Stay Awhile and Listen series, and the Gairden Chronicles series of fantasy novels for young adults. Outside of writing, he enjoys playing Mario, Zelda, and Dark Souls games, and will be happy to discuss at length the myriad reasons why Dark Souls 2 is the best in the series. Follow him online at davidlcraddock.com and @davidlcraddock.