Solo developer Brian Provinciano has said that Retro City Rampage saw the “healthiest tail” in sales on the Nintendo 3DS out of all the platforms the game has been released on in a blog post.
Overall, the 3DS version has sold less and made less revenue than the PC and PlayStation versions (which includes PS4, PS3, PS Vita), but that’s due to it being released 15 months afterwards. “[H]ad it been released simultaneously with the others it’s possible that it could’ve become the best selling out of all eight platforms (or at least toe to toe),” Provinciano writes. He puts this down to it being the right kind of game for the 3DS and promotion on Nintendo’s part.
Provinciano also makes notes on all the other platforms too. PC sold the most units but due to the discount driven nature of Steam this isn’t reflected in revenue as much. PlayStation platforms have been great sellers and money makers for him, especially due to promotions from PlayStation. He also notes that, despite the stigma that lies over the PS Vita, RCR has proven to be a healthy seller on that system.
The Xbox 360 version suffered due to not being promoted and not getting a decent store position – if you want promotion you have to pay for it. Plus, on the Xbox 360 you still need a publisher to get a game released on anything except the left for dead Xbox Live Indie Games store (the ID @ Xbox program only applies to Xbox One).
As you can see in the pie charts above, the Wii version of Retro City Rampage sold poorly, attributing to 0.1% of sales. And, as the note reveals, the Wii’s threshold policy means that the revenue for Provinciano on those sales is zero. You can probably start to see why Provinciano previously stated that he would not be bringing the game to Wii U.
Overall, Retro City Rampage has sold over 400,000 units and pushed over 270,000 copies to PlayStation Plus members.
