“Are you the world’s next all-star?” asks The Finals‘ Steam bio. “Are you up to the challenge?” With fame, fortune, and glory on the line, contestants are flocking to the free-to-play FPS to try out its all-new beta, and as a result it’s currently pulling more players than both GTA 5 and Baldur’s Gate 3 on Steam.
If you’re not familiar with The Finals, it’s a high-octane FPS game where you’re tasked with taking down enemy squads and making it to the titular Finals. You can smash through walls à la Rainbow Six Siege, and build barricades like Fortnite, all while wearing a huge panda head. Could things really get any better?
With The Finals beta dropping yesterday, Thursday, October 26, there’s already been a huge influx of players – so much so that the game’s current Steam player count sits well above both GTA 5 and Baldur’s Gate 3.
At the time of writing, The Finals is fifth on Steam Charts‘ top games list, lagging just behind staples like Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2. Sitting in the fifth spot with 111,891 current players, the beta saw a peak player count of 117,540. For context, at the moment GTA V and BG3 have 74,438 and 62,233 current players respectively.
This is impressive in itself, but the beta’s rollout didn’t quite go as planned. As the game went live, developer Embark Studios tweeted out that “millions of you have signed up for playtesting and the system is rolling out access gradually.”
It appears to have taken a few hours for the process to finally complete, with the team dropping a second tweet saying “thanks for being so patient with us as we sorted out a few hickups [sic]!” around four hours after the initial one.
As someone who fell out of love with the likes of Apex Legends and Valorant, I’m intrigued by The Finals. Panda outfit aside, the vibrant art style, extensive character customization, and flashy, gameshow setting have me intrigued. Also, it’s free-to-play, which always helps.
If you, like me, are planning to dive in, we’ve got a list of the best The Finals weapons, as well as a list of all of The Finals classes – I’ll be zipping around with a Light Build for sure.