Indie games are going head-to-head with AAA titles and winning, if Steam's confirmed 'most popular indie game of 2025' is anything to go by. Created by solo developer TVGS, Schedule I has sold an estimated two million copies on Steam.
These figures put the drug kingpin sim in the same revered company as Assassin's Creed Shadows, and even beating Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl, which has sold around one million copies. In fact, peak player numbers on Steam put Schedule I ahead of many AAA games in terms of popularity, including Sid Meier's Civilization VII, Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, and the incredible Split Fiction.
At launch on 24 March, Schedule I immediately became the second most popular game on Steam, just behind Monster Hunter Wilds with its 1.3 million peak concurrent users.
Steam's most popular game
The success of Schedule 1, which has been nicknamed a 'Walter White simulator' based on the classic HBO show Breaking Bad, the game sees players build a drug empire from the ground up, from escaping cops on a skateboard to developing new meth recipes.
The success comes down to the accessible and ironically addictive mini-games mixed with a co-op mode that enables one player to be the cook and the other the street dealer; be Walter White or Jesse Pinkman.
Reddit user Intelligent-Cable-50 summed up why Schedule I is proving so, well… addictive: "Do you like programming? Do you like simulators? Do you like running a business? Then yes it’s REALLY good. Especially for this price point. Just a single developer named Tyler made the game and oh my god it’s phenomenal. Even the music is amazing. Amazes me it’s just one dude that did all this. My man and I are up until 4am playing this game and he’s never even done drugs before. He somehow likes it more than me, a pothead."
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Schedule I is the goal for many indie devs channelling creativity to make the dream of releasing a successful game. If you want to read more inspirational insights on creating video games, read our interviewers with the devs and artists behind Wax Heads, Wanderstop and the Houdini-made Wheel World.
For more, read our guide to the best game development software, the best digital art software and you may need one of the best drawing tablets.
