Xbox Game Pass' Subnautica 2 blew up the Steam charts in minutes at its Early Access launch — it's peaked at nearly half a million concurrent players

While I knew that the Early Access release of the long-awaited Subnautica 2 was going to be big, I wasn't expecting it to be one of the largest game launches we've seen in quite some time — though perhaps I should have, given that its preorder sales were neck and neck with those of Forza Horizon 6.

Yet, as it turns out, that's precisely what it's been thus far. Despite releasing on Xbox, Xbox on PC, and Steam just a few short hours ago, the alien underwater exploration and survival game sequel has 424,940 concurrent players on the latter platform as I'm writing this. A bit earlier in the day, it peaked at 467,582 — just under half a million folks diving into its majestic otherworldly oceans.

Notably, that makes Subnautica 2 the second most popular new game at launch this year, at least on Steam; it's second only to Slay the Spire 2, which had an even larger peak player count of 574,638 at release. It's surpassed other games that've performed incredibly well at release, such as Resident Evil Requiem.

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Accompanying that news is confirmation from developer Unknown Worlds Entertainment and co-publisher Krafton that Subnautica 2 has already sold over 1 million copies, with countless additional sales no doubt racking up throughout the last several hours.

Undoubtedly, the game's performance so far has greatly pleased Unknown Worlds and Krafton, especially since these player count and sales numbers only include folks on Steam and those who purchased a full copy, respectively. Subnautica 2 is also on Xbox and Xbox on PC with full access available through Xbox Game Pass (and Xbox Play Anywhere support) too, meaning that its overall player count is surely far higher.

It's also nice to see after all the tumultuous legal drama that's preceded the game's arrival throughout the last several months, all of which began last year when Krafton controversially delayed Subnautica 2 indefinitely after it was scheduled to release in 2025. It also fired the game's founders and replaced Unknown Worlds' CEO.

Unknown Worlds' leadership filed a lawsuit claiming that Krafton wrongfully removed them from the project and did so to avoid paying a $250 million bonus that hinged on the game performing well in 2025, while Krafton argued the dev's leaders were being negligent and that Subnautica 2 needed the delay. A judge eventually sided with the series' founders, reinstated Unknown Worlds' CEO Ted Gill, and gave him control over the game's release — finally leading to its highly anticipated arrival.

Krafton is legally required to keep that $250 million bonus offer alive for most of 2026 as a result of the case, and if Subnautica 2 continues to perform as well as it has thus far on launch day, I imagine it won't be long before it satisfies the performance goals for the payout. That's great news for Unknown Worlds' development team.

All in all, I'm just glad that Subnautica 2 is out, and I look forward to seeing how it grows as development of the game continues in Early Access. I'm busy playing some other games right now, but I do look forward to jumping into this one at some point, especially since it has co-op. I'm always looking for things to play with friends, so sooner or later, I'm picking it up.

Are you looking forward to diving into Subnautica 2 now that it's out? I'm interested in hearing from you, so leave a comment and vote in our poll.

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