Idea check

Pick up to three tags and a price. Get a plain answer: your odds of a $100k first year, what launches like yours earned, what you are up against, and what to watch for.

1Your idea

2The readout

Your odds

19 in 100 4X launches at $10 to $20 earned $100k+ in their first year. That is about the same as the 18 in 100 for all indie launches at $10 to $20.

Chance of $100k+

19 in 100

Notch: 18 in 100 for all indie launches at $10 to $20.

Typical first year

$9,712

10% of the way to $100k. Half earned less. Notch: $8,234, every game at $10 to $20.

Competition

32 launches

At $10 to $20, in two years (about 16 a year). Busier than 33 in 100 single tags; the notch is the middle one.

Coming soon

304 games

Coming-soon games with this tag. More than 41 in 100 single tags. Highest on wishlists: Falling Frontier (#37), Fragile Existence (#202).

What launches like this earned in their first year

Only the top tenth clears $100k; the top quarter falls short.

Typical launchHalf earned less$9,71210% of the way to $100k.

Top quarter1 in 4 earned at least$79,19579% of the way to $100k.

Top tenth1 in 10 earned at least$297,7353.0 times the $100k line.

4X at $10 to $20 past the $100k line (squeezed to fit, not to scale) every game at $10 to $20

Warning lamps

None lit

One-hit marketOff
Clear.
Audience splitOff
Clear.
Small sampleOff
Clear.
May be luckOff
Clear.
Changed recentlyToo few
Too few to tell: it needs 5+ hits in both views.

Lens checkHolds in 2 of 3, 1 too few to tell. Standard: the base the others are compared with. West-facing view: holds. Without the breakout: holds. Last 18 months: too few to tell.

Standard, West-facing view, Without the breakout, Last 18 months. Lenses use all prices.

Earnings are estimated from store reviews, so the $100k line is soft: across the estimate's range, the share of all indie launches above it runs from about 5 to 8 in 100. Sales on Steam before Steam's cut; about 58% of it reaches the developer.

Indie paid launches 12 to 36 months old, measured 3 Oct 2026. Coming-soon counts from the store, 3 Oct 2026.

3What next

Monthly read

Free

A monthly read on 4X

Once a month we re-measure your odds at $10 to $20 and tell you in plain words what changed.

Your odds, re-measured on the latest launches
How last month's launches with these tags did
Who is about to launch, highest on wishlists first

If the read went out today 3 Oct 2026

Your odds19 in 100 earned $100k+ at $10 to $20, against 18 in 100 for all indie launches at $10 to $20.
EarningsTypical first year $9,712; 1 in 10 earned $297,735 or more.
Launches87 games of every kind with these tags in the last 12 months (64 the year before).
Coming soon304 games; highest on wishlists Falling Frontier (#37).

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Comparables

Lifetime

Top earners with these tags, est. lifetime salesFree until launch

Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Eralaunched 2026, 19,535 reviews$14.9M

1Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era$14.9M2026

2ZEPHON$1.5M2024

3Songs of Silence$1.3M2024

4Ascension$582k2025

5After Inc: Revival$545k2025

Open free preview

ComparablesFree until launchClick to unlockLifetime top earners like yours

4Data notes

Odds and earnings: Figures of 3 Oct 2026: 26,280 indie paid launches 12 to 36 months old (majors, $40+, adult and free games out). A hit is an estimated first-year revenue of $100k or more. Earnings are sales on Steam after discounts and regional prices, before Steam's 30% cut, refunds and sales tax. About 58% of it reaches the developer. "Typical" is the median; "top quarter" is the 75th percentile and "top tenth" the 90th.
Tags and combinations: 319 tags (genres and descriptors such as 2D and Casual), 4,634 tag pairs and 8,246 three-tag combinations. Pairs and triples are only in the data with 40 or more launches, so a missing one has fewer than 40; the exact count is not stored.
Price band rates: under $5: 1 in 219 (13,780 launches); $5 to $10: 1 in 30 (6,975 launches); $10 to $20: 18 in 100 (4,301 launches); $20 to $40: 40 in 100 (1,224 launches). All prices: 1 in 17. With "Any price", the comparison is all indie launches.
Gauges: Competition places the pick among combinations of the same size (single tags, pairs or triples) at the same price; coming soon places single tags and pairs among all genres and niches. The notch is the middle one. Earnings notches show every game at the price.
Lamps: One-hit market: one game holds over half the money. Audience split: the West-facing view (games mostly reviewed outside China) moves the chance more than a random cut of the same size would, with 5+ hits on both sides, or moves typical earnings over 25% with 100+ launches in the view. Review language is measured for games with 2,000+ reviews; for smaller games it is guessed from the name. Small sample: under 30 launches or 5 hits. May be luck: the gap to the base rate is small enough that chance alone could give it 95 times in 100. Changed recently: the same test as Audience split, on launches from the last 18 months. With fewer than 5 hits a lamp says too few to tell and stays grey.
Lens check: Computed on all-price figures (by-price lens figures are not computed yet). Standard is the base and is not counted. Three-tag combinations carry no lenses yet, so their pips stay grey.
Competition: Launches in the two-year sample. Coming-soon counts for tags and pairs come from the nightly niche rollup (3 Oct 2026); for three tags, from the coming-soon list, which stores only each game's top five tags, so the count is a floor. Named games are the highest on wishlists; adult-tagged games are left out.
Comparables: The top indie earners stored for these tags, with est. lifetime sales (not first year, and before Steam's cut). Three-tag combinations have none stored, so the card shows the most specific readable pair inside and says so. Matching by price and launch year is not computed yet.
Soft estimate: Revenue is reviews times a multiplier times price. Checked against 453 published sales figures: right for the typical game (31 to 35 real copies per review since 2020; we use 30), rough for any single game. Across the multiplier's range the overall base rate runs 4.8% to 8.4%, so every readout carries that note.