Owlchemy Labs today announced that its tongue-in-cheek simulator game, Job Simulator (2016), has earned over $3 million in sales since its launch last April. According to Owlchemy Labs, this combined with the fact that Job Simulator has generated over 250 million views from videos created by the YouTube community, makes Job Simulator “the most popular VR title to date.”

Job Simulator was included as a launch title for HTC Vive when it was initially released in April 2016. With an early wave of built-in users, buzz surrounding the madcap VR simulator spread primarily through YouTube. Later, the game was included as day-one launch titles for both PlayStation VR in mid-October and Oculus Touch in early December.

Job Simulator was ranked the best-selling PlayStation VR game in North America for both October and November. Steam Spy reports the game has over 100,000 owners on Steam alone.

job simulator office worker

“When we started development of Job Simulator, it was a massive risk to bet it all on a project that could ONLY work in VR, especially with consumer VR hardware productization so far off and ambiguous” says Owlchemy Labs CEO Alex Schwartz. “It’s great to finally see the numbers show that even in such an early market, success can already be found. We’re incredibly proud of the fact that our game has struck a chord with so many players across the globe, both young and old.”

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“I think a huge part of Job Simulator’s success comes from how fun it is to just watch someone play around and be silly in VR” says Schwartz. “Tons of people have seen their favorite YouTuber play around in the physics sandbox that is our game, and that’s great for showing everyone how interactive and magical VR can be. These earliest attempts at mixing real-life video footage with virtual reality are the best way to show people what it truly feels like to be inside of a virtual space so we’re letting streamers and content creators easily share VR footage that’s clear, understandable, and ready for mainstream viewers.”

Other VR titles from Owlchemy Labs include base-jumping sim Aaaaaculus!(2013) and a collaboration between Adult Swim entitled Rick and Morty Simulator: Virtual Rick-ality. Owlchemy is also beta testing their OwlchemyVR Mixed Reality system, an in-engine tool suite for creating mixed reality (MR) videos that’s reportedly much easier and faster to manage than previous MR setups.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • DiGiCT Ltd

    Just hyped lucky IMO, there are much better VR expierences out there.
    I got it with the Vive preorder, they lucky get payd for all the preordered sets included with Vive.
    It is fun for the first time up to at the most 30 minutes, after that this entire job simulator gets very boring !
    If you would ask me to pay for this VR game i would for sure say no to it, cant even call it a game either.
    I would have called it a time killer if you have nothing better to do with your time.
    The sales above are not chosen sales from customers, the preorder payments by HTC are included which makes it illusion as being a good game , as the sales are clearly from the preorder.

    • Get Schwifty!

      Possibly, but a lot of people enjoy it nonetheless :)

  • DougP

    Wonderful game!

  • J.C.

    This is the game I put non-gamers into after theblu. Everyone grasps the concept quickly, and has a blast making silly things happen. It’d be nice if there was an “endless” mode, but that would remove a large part of the humor from the Bot responses.

    I don’t think it’s worth the full asking price, if you’re not going to have a parade of people coming by to play around on your VR setup. With no multiplayer and no content past the initial tasks, the urge to play it again dies quickly.

    I’m thrilled to see ANY VR game making a profit, as lately all I’ve heard is doom and gloom from devs on the profitability side.

    • Get Schwifty!

      They are working on eventually adding more “jobs” as DLC, but it takes time. As it stands, its give or take 2 hours of play, and if you catch it on sale I think its’ hands down worth it if for no other reason its a great intro as you said for non gamers to taste VR. You are either into the humor of it or you aren’t, but it’s certainly has a polished feel that most VR games don’t currently.

  • dextrovix

    Some of that revenue will come from the fact the title was included in pre-orders, but nevertheless it is impressive to have reached that target. VR currently has a premium price attached to titles, that generally means maybe the 20+ you might get from a single player campaign from a standard title doesn’t apply to VR. It makes that up by being on a different immersion level for me, but I hope once the user base expands over the comings years it’ll mean larger developer teams might be able to commit to bringing longer experiences to market.

  • Nein

    Good first baby steps. $3M is pocket change though.

  • Frank

    The whole idea of “mixing real-life video footage with virtual reality” is really getting abused lately, especially by Microsoft. This is going to make a lot of people disappointed and really bust the bubble!

    • hyperskyper

      How so?

      • N. Stein

        There are all sorts of ads promising the impossible. False advertising should not be legal.

        • hyperskyper

          How is mixed reality footage promising the impossible? You accurately see the user’s environment from another angle.

          • Frankie

            What you see is not what you get. Try Hololens and you will find a very narrow FOV compared to any of their videos. They know developers won’t ask for refunds like consumers will!

        • Dennis Molema

          It’s the only way to accurately portray the experience clearly, really…