Valve has updated its Steam games stats page with new billboard-like images for its top selling games and most played games. This overhaul of the page does make it far more legible and attractive, but it also looks set to reward games that are already popular and selling well.
The new stats page has the number of regular and concurrent players on the platform listed up top -- over 18 million at the time of writing, with a claimed peak of over 25.6 million -- while the top selling and most played games sit underneath. The top game at the time of writing in each category is Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II and Counter Strike: Global Offensive, respectively.
It seems likely that the game on the right will mostly stay the same, as CS:GO is a consistent king of that hill, with occasional challengers to the thrown as new vogue games are released and played through, before everyone goes back to their favorites. The top seller, however, is likely to change more often, and will include free games too, since it's related to revenue generated through Steam, so free games with popular DLC will also be able to make a splash. Indeed, CS:GO, Apex Legends, and Destiny 2 are all inside the top 10 and they are all free to play.
Somehow Football Manager 2023 has made it into the top 16, despite not being out yet. Who's pre-ordering games in this day and age?