ACC player counts in review: June 2022

Back in March, we received the Challengers DLC for Assetto Corsa Competizione (ACC). This largely affected April’s numbers. So much so, that even May was still riding its coattails(and that of a free weekend). I expected the numbers for June to drop to somewhere around 4500 average peak concurrently as Summer is closing in. As we’ve seen in the past few years, June historically sees a steep decline in player activity: 8.5% in 2020 and 11.4% in 2021. Will June 2022 show a similar drop? How far was I off in predicting this month’s numbers? Read on to find out!

In this series of articles – I’ve been doing this since March 2020 – I analyze the playercounts from Assetto Corsa Competizione (ACC) using data from both steamdb and steamcharts. I implement the data into my own spreadsheets, creating my own graphics and tables.

A short TL;DR in advance:

  • Player activity behaved rather predictively with a decline to 4450 average concurrent players;
  • The summer days have historically shown lower player activity, but there’s a year-on-year growth of about 15%;
  • The American Track Pack released right at the end of June, showing promise for July.

June 2022: comparing daily ACC player counts

Before we head into this month’s numbers, let’s first recap May 2022 to give it some context. May achieved an average peak concurrent player count of 5168, but this was largely due to a free weekend at the start of the month. This saw player counts soaring to over 7000, 7091 to be exact. The last week of May achieved an average of 4555 peak concurrent players, which I saw as an indication for June 2022.

Now, in the graph below (figure 1), you can see whether that assumption rang true.

Fig. 1: Peak concurrent player counts

In a nutshell: yes, yes it did.

June started out as expected, with peak concurrent player counts bouncing between the 4K and 5K lines regularly. Only the second part of June saw peaks below the 4K line.

June’s biggest regular peak was a nice and round 5300, achieved on Sunday, June 5th. I say regular because June 30th saw the unexpected – for me at least – release of the American Track Pack-DLC. This saw the peak concurrent player count jump to this month’s highest value: 5411.

This is rather low for a DLC release. However, this might be due to a few factors, such as the Steam Summer Sale kicking off. Many regular players would likely be playing newly bought games, instead of their chosen sim.

June’s lowest peak was on Friday, June 24th, with 3737 concurrent players, which is now the lowest number of peak concurrent players in 2022. However, this is still far above the lowest peak concurrent of 2021, which saw just 2767 people play concurrently on Friday, July 23rd (2021).

Figure 2: Daily peak concurrent player counts for 2022

The graph above shows all of the peak concurrent player counts for ACC in 2022. What is remarkable to me is how stable the numbers have been since mid-May. It’s also fun to see the repeating weekly pattern, with Sunday and Monday showing peak activity, whereas Friday evenings show negative peaks.

June 2022: comparing weekly ACC player counts

Figure 3 below compares this month’s weekly averages to last year’s. This perhaps shows the slight decline during the month better. The grey line does temporarily peak sharply above 2022’s red line – this was due to a free weekend in June 2021, which shows a similar peak to May 2022’s free weekend.

Fig. 3: Weekly average concurrent player counts.

June’s final full week achieved an average concurrent player count of 4251, which will set a baseline for next month’s numbers. This value is still some 500 higher than the weekly average in 2021, indicating a year-on-year growth of approximately 15% in terms of player activity.

What this means for this month, you’ll read in the next chapter as seen below.

June 2022: comparing monthly ACC player counts

Fig. 4: All-time peak and average player counts

This month’s average came out to 4450 average concurrent players, just 50 below my rather optimistic estimate. While the decline compared to May seems rather steep, remember that May had a free weekend with player numbers soaring above 7K concurrently. I did some calculations in last month’s article which showed that, with the free weekend removed, it would have achieved an average of 4988.

4450 is a decline of 13.89% compared to May (figure 5, bottom left), or a decline of 718 in absolute numbers (figure 6, bottom right). With the free weekend removed, this would’ve been a decline of 10.79% or 538 respectively. Still, a fairly big decline, but also much more in line with the declines in June 2020 (8.48%) and June 2021 (11.40%).

Fig. 5: Relative growth since January 2020
Fig. 6: Absolute growth since January 2020

So yes, the numbers are down this month. But, they are within expected limits. There is absolutely no reason for concern. So hold your horses, ACC is still far from dead – especially with the new American tracks added to the roster.

Looking forward to July 2022 and beyond

The American Track Pack offers three new circuits. I’ve personally tested them – which for me was actually the first time driving with my wheel in about 14 months. Especially Watkins Glen is a joy to drive, and I expect a lot of people to put in the hours to master the new tracks next month.

However, the timing of its release is not opportune: just as June 2020 and June 2021 showed a steep decline, so did the subsequent months in 2020 and 2021. With a notable exception of July 2020, which saw the release of the GT4 DLC.

Hopefully, July 2022 will show a similar trend to July 2020, but I expect it won’t show a similar growth in player activity as it did back then. This is due to diminishing returns: the GT4 release saw ACC expand its content by a very large chunk with 10 new cars in a whole different class. Whereas the American Track Pack is ‘just’ three new tracks. It does not add another dimension to the game as the GT4 pack did.

In fact, I think July’s average will most likely be around the same as June’s. This would still mean a year-on-year increase of over 25% compared to July 2021.

Next to the positives, the release of the American Track Pack opens up a new point of contention. What’s next?

There are now officially no more DLCs in the works. Would this new pack be the final release for ACC? Maybe, maybe not. I suspect at least one more DLC pack could be in the works. And I expect it to be a 2022 Track Pack, with a potential release window at the end of this year or the start of the next.

While we have already received the 2022 car liveries, we are still ‘owed’ some tracks which have been added to the calendar since 2019. Of those, we only received Imola which was an easy shoo-in for the Italy-based Kunos Simulazione in the early lockdown days.

Other tracks, such as Valencia and Magny Cours have since been added, and Zandvoort has been given a large redesign for F1. This year, Hockenheim was also added to the calendar. I think a 2022 track pack would consist of a combination of three tracks, with Zandvoort being the most likely candidate to not be included among the rest.

None of this is based on any evidence I have, but with ACC still showing signs of growth, I think it is likely that Kunos will be receiving the green light to keep developing more content.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments!

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  1. ACC player counts in review: December 2022 - FELIXDICIT
    January 1, 2023

    […] June 2022 (avg. 4450, -13.79%) […]

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