It's a rare VR game that uses Steam as its lead platform these days, but that hasn't stopped Into The Radius 2 earning nearly $3 million revenue since launch.
Six months since its early access release, Into The Radius 2 is one of 2024's two VR-only Steam games alongside Metro Awakening to surpass 1000 reviews on Steam, earning a “Mostly Positive” rating. Speaking to UploadVR during PG Connects London 2025, CM Games CEO Vlad Rannik is understandably pleased with the sequel's initial performance, though the studio's strategy wasn't risk free.
“We took a gamble with a game that wasn't complete. For some people, early access means a complete game with some bugs. In our case, we really wanted to get community feedback and input before most of the mechanics are in place.”
Part of this gamble comes from initially excluding mechanics that were in the first game, like the hunger system. Rannik says that's because the team already knew how to build it.
“We didn't prioritize it for the early access because we know how it works, and we know how we can make it work. So, we didn't need to test it as much. From the player perspective, obviously it's a fundamental feature of the first game. So, we gambled there a little bit, but it went well. We got lots of input and most of our ideas were validated, which was the most important thing.”
Our launch review for Into The Radius 2 found an “enjoyable” sequel that felt “barebones,” though two major updates and several smaller patches have since followed.
Rannik advised they chose that specific point to launch in July “because we needed to draw the line somewhere,” once the core gameplay feature set was mostly complete.
“From the developer's perspective, you want to have as much stuff in the game as possible. But where you have too much stuff, you can miss the opportunity to fix things if they are not validated. There's always that feeling like the game is not complete enough, but it's also too far along already. We knew we would get some flak for not having certain things, so let's survive this period of warranted and expected criticism.”
It's therefore unsurprising to learn that Rannik considers expectation management the most difficult part of early access. He continues reading user comments across Discord and Steam, admitting that he's often tempted to confirm what's coming up. However, Rannik says he's limited on what can be announced.
“Once you announce that something is coming, people expect it to be delivered, of course they do. But we might find a complication that makes it more sensible to launch something else instead. So we put the first thing on the back burner for another couple of months to do some R&D on the issue… How do we find the compromise where we can give people some assurance, but not overpromise and ultimately disappoint them?”
It's an approach largely informed by the original Into The Radius' own early access release. Rannik admits they had the “dubious luck” of fully launching after Half-Life: Alyx, which he claims reshaped player expectations, while also elaborating on what “distinct categories” of players are looking for with its games.
“Some people want to have a shooting range type of game where they can just jump in, have fun, play around with guns and enjoy the gunplay. We didn't really cater to them because of Into The Radius' slower pacing. Then there's a group who want a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. like experience, where they get all the loot, bandits, NPCs, factions, kind of like an open-ended living war.”
Meeting these expectations is what led to Into The Radius 1's post-launch being “basically early access all over again” before reaching Version 2.0, eventually ending with Update 2.7.
Rannik believes this approach to free updates helped drive additional sales long-term, revealing that Into The Radius has sold 800k copies across all platforms. He compares it to a live service game but “without any season pass bullshit,” referring to how such titles usually add content partially locked behind microtransactions or subscriptions.
“What we did instead in ITR1 was just improving and expanding the game. At one point, we had a developer and sound engineer spontaneously prototype an in-game guitar that served no immediate gameplay purpose at face value, but also made a lot of sense in the desolate and lonely setting of ITR. So we went through with it, and it became one of the trademark features.”
Moving back to the sequel, CM Games addressed the challenges faced with developing the team's first VR multiplayer game. Following criticisms surrounding online co-op, Rannik states the team were fully aware of the complexities this would introduce, confirming the feedback is being monitored.
“In the end, it's been harder than we expected it to be,” he tells me.
As for choosing Steam as its lead platform, I queried whether CM Games saw avoiding Quest during early access as a risk. Evidently, it's paid off since Into The Radius 2 has earned nearly $3 million in revenue so far, and Rannik states choosing Steam provides “less friction” during early access.
“We picked Steam because it's more productive for us at this time, so we can focus on the gameplay and not necessarily Quest-specific optimizations. For the purpose of building the core game, it's a little easier to go the Steam route. Going multiplatform with early access would delay us and take our attention away from building the best gameplay we can, so we had to pick one platform.”
Rannik points out that Into The Radius 1 ports later arrived on Quest and eventually PlayStation VR2 after leaving early access. While he didn't directly confirm any multiplatform plans for Into The Radius 2 yet, CM Games are interested in other platforms after they enter full release.
“We're absolutely looking at getting Into The Radius to all major platforms.”
Into The Radius 2 is available now on Steam Early Access, and it's currently targeting a full release in early 2026.
