The Game Census
Populous™ cover art

Populous™

Bullfrog Productions · Electronic Arts · 2024-03-07

SteamGOGEpic Games StoreMicrosoft StoreGame Pass

RPGStrategy

Modes: Single player, Multiplayer · Perspectives: Bird view / Isometric

Releases: Sep 01, 2011 (PC (Microsoft Windows)), Mar 23, 1990 (Sharp X68000), 1992 (Acorn Archimedes), 1989 (Atari ST/STE), Jun 05, 1989 (DOS), Mar 16, 1990 (PC-9800 Series)

Move mountains, part the seas, and lead mortal armies to victory in Populous. Take on the powers of a mighty deity and battle for supremacy against an enemy god, using thoughtful strategy to shape the isometric world and the fate of its people.

Populous™ is a 2024 RPG and Strategy game priced at $4.99, with an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 owners and a Very Positive review sentiment (85% of 66 reviews).

3
playing now
85%
positive of 66 reviews
Very Positive
steam's rating (official)
100,000–200,000
owners (SteamSpy est.)
74/100
IGDB user rating (47 ratings)
8h
to beat · rushed 2h · completionist 26h
bronze
deck/linux tier (ProtonDB)
Playable
Steam Deck (Valve)
SteamOS: Playable
$4.99
steam price (US)

3 players in-game as of 2026-10-14 16:00 UTC (census sample)

Populous is a video game developed by Bullfrog Productions and published by Electronic Arts for the Amiga in March 1989, then quickly the Atari ST and MS-DOS. Many conversions followed, including for the Genesis, Super NES, and PC Engine consoles. Populous is considered the first god game. With over four million copies sold, Populous is one of the best-selling PC games of all time.

Health check

Quiet
  • · 3 players in-game at the last census sample.
  • · 11 reviews in the last 8 weeks (~1/week).
  • · Review velocity up 0% vs the prior 8 weeks.
  • · Top 54% of 13,891 RPG games in the census by review count.

Health tier since 2026-09-02

Estimated sales: 1.3k–3.0k copies

Review-multiple estimate from 66 total reviews — how this is computed.

Current store prices

Microsoft Store$0.00
GOG$0.99-83%

Deal snapshots via CheapShark, refreshed daily.

All-time low: $0.89 at GOG (2018-06-04) · bundled 1×via IsThereAnyDeal

12-month high $5.99 · on sale 85 of 100 observed days · $0.10 above the all-time low (census price snapshots)

Review momentum

PositiveNegative
161620242026Week of 2024-03-01: 16 positiveWeek of 2024-04-01: 3 positiveWeek of 2024-05-01: 4 positiveWeek of 2024-05-01: 2 negativeWeek of 2024-06-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2024-07-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2024-07-01: 1 negativeWeek of 2024-08-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2024-11-01: 3 positiveWeek of 2024-11-01: 1 negativeWeek of 2024-12-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2024-12-01: 1 negativeWeek of 2025-01-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2025-03-01: 3 positiveWeek of 2025-04-01: 2 positiveWeek of 2025-05-01: 1 negativeWeek of 2025-06-01: 1 negativeWeek of 2025-07-01: 1 negativeWeek of 2025-08-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2025-09-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2025-11-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2025-12-01: 1 positiveWeek of 2026-01-01: 1 negativeWeek of 2026-04-01: 2 positiveWeek of 2026-05-01: 2 positiveWeek of 2026-06-01: 3 positiveWeek of 2026-07-01: 1 positive
Weekly review counts (Steam review histogram). Positive above the line, negative below.

Players online

602026-09-15 01:00 — 1 players2026-09-16 10:00 — 2 players2026-09-17 17:00 — 2 players2026-09-19 01:00 — 1 players2026-09-20 08:00 — 4 players2026-09-21 16:00 — 3 players2026-09-22 23:00 — 1 players2026-09-24 07:00 — 2 players2026-09-25 14:00 — 3 players2026-09-26 22:00 — 3 players2026-09-28 05:00 — 2 players2026-09-29 13:00 — 2 players2026-09-30 20:00 — 3 players2026-10-02 04:00 — 2 players2026-10-03 11:00 — 0 players2026-10-04 20:00 — 2 players2026-10-06 03:00 — 0 players2026-10-07 11:00 — 1 players2026-10-08 18:00 — 3 players2026-10-10 02:00 — 1 players2026-10-11 09:00 — 3 players2026-10-12 17:00 — 6 players2026-10-14 00:00 — 1 players2026-10-14 16:00 — 3 players
Concurrent players, hourly average, last 30 days (census samples).
142Mar 2024Aug 2026Mar 2024 — avg 14 · peak 54Apr 2024 — avg 5 · peak 13May 2024 — avg 4 · peak 11Jun 2024 — avg 3 · peak 13Jul 2024 — avg 4 · peak 11Sep 2024 — avg 2 · peak 7Oct 2024 — avg 3 · peak 7Nov 2024 — avg 3 · peak 10Dec 2024 — avg 2 · peak 6Jan 2025 — avg 2 · peak 6Feb 2025 — avg 3 · peak 8Mar 2025 — avg 2 · peak 6Apr 2025 — avg 2 · peak 5May 2025 — avg 4 · peak 8Jun 2025 — avg 4 · peak 9Jul 2025 — avg 3 · peak 8Aug 2025 — avg 3 · peak 10Sep 2025 — avg 3 · peak 8Oct 2025 — avg 4 · peak 9Nov 2025 — avg 3 · peak 9Jan 2026 — avg 2 · peak 7Feb 2026 — avg 3 · peak 6Mar 2026 — avg 2 · peak 6Apr 2026 — avg 2 · peak 11May 2026 — avg 3 · peak 10Jun 2026 — avg 2 · peak 5Aug 2026 — avg 2 · peak 8
Monthly average players (source: steamcharts.com) — history via steamcharts.com; live census sampling since Aug 2026.

Price history

$5.99$0.002015-01-012026-10-142015-01-01 — best price $4.992015-06-22 — best price $4.992015-12-12 — best price $5.992017-03-13 — best price $5.992018-01-16 — best price $5.992018-09-25 — best price $5.992019-06-18 — best price $5.992020-01-02 — best price $5.992020-11-10 — best price $4.992021-02-15 — best price $5.992021-09-02 — best price $5.992022-02-21 — best price $5.992022-09-06 — best price $5.992023-01-14 — best price $5.992023-12-21 — best price $0.992024-03-31 — best price $1.992024-08-26 — best price $2.512024-11-27 — best price $2.492025-02-05 — best price $5.992025-04-10 — best price $2.392025-07-03 — best price $4.992025-09-22 — best price $2.492025-11-25 — best price $2.392026-01-23 — best price $2.992026-03-19 — best price $3.002026-05-18 — best price $4.992026-07-09 — best price $4.992026-08-30 — best price $2.392026-09-09 — best price $2.392026-09-19 — best price $2.392026-09-29 — best price $0.992026-10-09 — best price $0.992026-10-14 — best price $0.99
Lowest recorded price across tracked stores, per day (census snapshots).

Attention

5751342026-05-28 — 166 pageviews2026-06-01 — 575 pageviews2026-06-05 — 134 pageviews2026-06-09 — 154 pageviews2026-06-13 — 155 pageviews2026-06-17 — 144 pageviews2026-06-21 — 197 pageviews2026-06-25 — 152 pageviews2026-06-29 — 174 pageviews2026-07-03 — 186 pageviews2026-07-07 — 144 pageviews2026-07-11 — 144 pageviews2026-07-15 — 146 pageviews2026-07-19 — 153 pageviews2026-07-23 — 168 pageviews2026-07-27 — 223 pageviews2026-07-31 — 293 pageviews2026-08-04 — 154 pageviews2026-08-08 — 142 pageviews2026-08-12 — 158 pageviews2026-08-16 — 169 pageviews2026-08-20 — 167 pageviews2026-08-24 — 178 pageviews2026-08-28 — 204 pageviews2026-09-01 — 156 pageviews2026-09-05 — 179 pageviews2026-09-09 — 166 pageviews2026-09-13 — 161 pageviews2026-09-17 — 156 pageviews2026-09-21 — 160 pageviews2026-09-25 — 157 pageviews2026-09-29 — 277 pageviews2026-10-03 — 140 pageviews2026-10-07 — 166 pageviews
Daily Wikipedia pageviews (attention proxy, census-recorded).

Details

WindowsSingle-playerMulti-playerPvPLAN PvPShared/Split Screen PvPShared/Split ScreenSteam CloudRemote Play TogetherFamily Sharing

Player tags

RPGGod GameStrategyIsometricStrategy RPG

Census log

Computed from census-recorded observations only — dates are observation dates.

Players also track

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Similarity via IGDB.

Wikipedia ↗Official site ↗