I was staring at a rising counter when the line went almost vertical and then steadied. You felt that twitch too—the moment when a business metric stops being theory and becomes a living thing. I remember thinking: this changes how we imagine early access.
At a late-night earnings roundup, Forza Horizon 6’s early access raked in $140 million in its first weekend
I’ve been covering launches long enough to know which numbers make people shift. In roughly two days of early access, Microsoft and Playground Games pulled in about $140 million (€129 million), according to Insider Gaming. That windfall came mostly from players who bought the premium edition at $120 (€110) a pop.
At my desk on Friday evening, the concurrent-player graph crested past 170,000
You could almost hear the chat rooms shift when Forza Horizon 6 peaked at 170,000 concurrent players—and has since climbed beyond 181,000. That’s more than double the peak of Horizon 5 at launch. If you track SteamDB and Xbox telemetry, those spikes aren’t random blips; they’re the kind of momentum that changes how studios price and package releases.
How much did Forza Horizon 6 make in early access?
Short answer: a lot. The premium-first model pulled in roughly $140 million (€129 million) within the first weekend of early access, per reporting by Insider Gaming. Those sales were concentrated in the premium edition, sold at about $120 (€110) per unit.
While reading Steam threads over coffee, the fan reaction felt split
I scrolled through Steam reviews and saw praise and dents in equal measure. Critics have an average Metacritic score of 92, the highest-rated game of 2026 so far, while Steam reviews sit at about 78 percent positive. English-language reviews lift that to 85 percent, but Simplified Chinese feedback hovers in “mixed,” dragging the global percentage down.
Is Forza Horizon 6 worth buying early access?
If you value scenery, performance, and a packed feature list, many critics say yes—Moyens I/O’s Arka Sarkar gave it a 9 and praised the Japanese setting. If you prefer waiting for day-one patches or lower prices, the mixed community feedback is a signal to pause. I’d tell you to weigh the rush of early content against the chance of post-launch fixes.
On a call with industry contacts, the revenue reshaped expectations about premium early access
Developers and publishers use these wins to calibrate future offers. The model that sold $120 (€110) premium packages and produced a nine-figure haul will be studied by Xbox teams and rival studios alike. Microsoft and Playground Games now have a case study: premium early access can be both a revenue engine and a reputational gamble.
Why are reviews mixed on Steam even though critics love it?
Critics review polished builds with context and time for benchmarks; players react to their first hours, regional server issues, localization, or content expectations. For Forza Horizon 6, the gorgeous Japanese map is a magnet for many players, while language support and regional pricing stirred frustration elsewhere.
There are two clear forces at work here: a high-priced premium edition that convinced thousands to pay now, and a map-as-sellpoint that drew players the way a strong scent draws a crowd. The result is one of the most profitable early-access rollouts we’ve ever seen, and the conversation now moves beyond sales into how publishers will design launches moving forward.
I’ll be watching how Steam, Metacritic, Insider Gaming, and Xbox report the next week of stats. You should too—because if this model spreads like wildfire, it will rewire how we buy games. So tell me: are you ready to pay for day-one access when the stakes keep getting higher?