Once Human Explodes at Steam Next Fest, Defying Expectations

Once Human has been a big hit on Steam's Next Fest
But the upcoming third-person shooter from NetEase also still lags behind mobile
With a PC-first release schedule, does this show how difficult discoverability is compared to mobile?

Once Human, the upcoming third-person shooter from NetEase, has surpassed 15m registrations worldwide - and the developer has been quick to point out the massive success the game saw at Steam Next Fest. However, there is a little wrinkle to that story.
While Once Human does in fact have over 15m pre-registrations, only 300,000 of those are wishlists on Steam. We did note before that NetEase, who have always been quite mobile-prominent, seem to be aiming for a PC-first release with Once Human, and have even given the desktop version of the game a much closer release date.
That's not to say we think NetEase is being Quixotic here. After all, Once Human is still massively popular on Steam, having drawn in the most demo players for Steam Next Fest. But it does show the dichotomy between mobile and PC, and how the former still outshines the latter.

NetEase does it
We won't exactly blame NetEase for aiming squarely at a PC audience, nor do we think it's a bad thing at all. But this news does demonstrate the disparity in audiences, and perhaps in how difficult it is even for a big developer to have the same level of popularity and discoverability on PC as they do on mobile.

In any case, if you're looking for games to play that's currently on mobile as you wait for Once Human's upcoming release, then why not take a gander at our mega-list of the best mobile games of 2024 (so far) to see what catches your eye?

Or you can dip into our other, constantly-growing list of the most anticipated mobile games of the year to see what other releases are coming up. Both of these lists have handpicked entries of what we think are the best, or could be the best, of mobile.