So, I got bored last night and decided to take a look at the achievement tracker here on Giant Bomb. One of the more interesting things about it to me is that it shows how many Giant Bomb members have played each title. Unfortunately, we can't sort information based on this statistic, so I dumped it over into Excel to sort it out. Now, this is just based on the 150+ games that I have played so it isn't all inclusive, and I didn't include the PS3 games from my list since it would skew the results seeing as trophies were tracked for such a short period of time. Here are some random facts I was able to pull out of the raw data. The results are somewhat depressing.

Halo 3 is the most played game with 27974.

Minesweeper Flags is the least played game with 253.

205 Giant Bomb members were a part of the Kinect Beta program last year. Don't tell anybody!

Only Halo 3 and Gears of War have been played by more people than Hexic HD.

Roughly 24% more people played the original Mass Effect than Mass Effect 2. I blame the Mako for scaring people away.

Shadow Complex is the most played XBLA title with 17269, which beats Castle Crashers by about 1500 players.

The number of players playing the Assassin's Creed franchise have fallen drastically from 22258 (AC1) to 18496 (AC2) to 9488 (ACB). That's a 57% drop between the first and third game.

A whopping 81% fewer people played Crackdown 2 than the original. And rightfully so.

Although it's still fairly early, 77% fewer people have played Dragon Age II than Origins.

And to continue the theme of lackluster sequels, 70% fewer people have played Fable III than Fable II.

In fact, I can't find a sequel that has more players than its predecessor. Even Modern Warfare 2 has about 1000 less than Call of Duty 4. Hell, even the Doritos games had a drop off from Dash of Destruction to Crash Course.

Despite being universally praised by reviews and being the only NBA game last year, NBA 2K11 has fewer players than NBA 2K9 and NBA 2K6.

Wanna know why Penny Arcade didn't get a third episode? While 3964 people played Episode 1, only 1510 have played Episode 2. Tycho redeemed himself though with the 3622 people who have played Poker Night at the Inventory.

More people have used the Rock Band Music Store than have played Rock Band 3. So sad.

Thanks to the XBLA release of Torchlight, now over 10000 Giant Bomb members have played the game.

Currently, there are 45 games on my list with over 10000 players. Bayonetta would need 103 more people to be the 46th.

More people have played Fable II Pub Games (4932) than Monday Night Combat, Rock Band 3, or Marvel vs Capcom 3.

Call of Duty 2 (10939) is the most played Xbox 360 launch title, just barely beating out Perfect Dark Zero (10296) and Project Gotham Racing 3 (9392).

There are 1565 people unable to hide the fact that they played DOA Xtreme 2 (myself included). Attaining ONE achievement in that game earns you a B ranking though.

If you played crackdown. You more or less played the second one as well. 

Awesome statistics! You should track down some more, later. 

Hmm, I can't remember if I got an achievement for DOA:X2 haha  Maybe my shame will be private. 
 
I can't believe more people played ME1 than 2 though. I didn't think it had near the hype 2 had. It was out nearly a year before I played it though. 
 
I contributed to the decline of AC stat. Played 1, thought it was horribly boring and repetitive, and didn't even bother with the supposedly better sequels. 
 
Crackdown 2 didn't come with a Halo beta haha 
 
EDIT: Also, Penny Arcade had no chance with me due to the episodic thing. Those games always seem to cost more for the first installment than I'd be willing to pay for the whole thing. Looking at you, Sonic 4.

thats an interesting read, one achievement in DOA paradise really earns you a B? thats dedication  
I myself have played every game mentioned bar that one, i played a lot of those sequels

Good work.

I think you may have a better time breaking that downwards sequel streak if you looked at PC games.  But then, when it comes to PC, a lot of the games I'm thinking of where sequels probably did better may not be tracked well on here since the originals were before the days of Steam.

@buft said:

thats an interesting read, one achievement in DOA paradise really earns you a B? thats dedication

Achievements in that game are ridiculous. I knew that going in and my goal was to get just one. Took about six hours probably. That was the last time I played it. For a game that's supposed to be fan service, it's not very fun.

Those are some very interesting numbers, nicely done :)

Some nice data porn in here.  Nicely done. 

The least played game on my S-RANK list is Blood Drive with 90 players...it's understandable because it is fucking terrible. I think you'll have a hard time finding anything less than that!

I don't see the depressing part.

@Video_Game_King said:

I don't see the depressing part.

Just the fact that there's a lot of good games that have not as good sequels. And conversely, good sequels that don't get played (AC Brotherhood, Rock Band 3).

This is really neat, thanks for sharing!

Well done Marino!  This is great info!

Brilliant work Marino, some of those results were pretty shocking. 

I had no idea Minesweeper Flags was out there. I used to love that game on MSN.

The RB3 and NBA 2K11 stats make me a sad panda. 
 
And why would you phrase it "x% fewer"? Seems odd, but alright. 
 
Pretty interesting, anyway.

@JJWeatherman: I played around with how to word that. I just picked one and stuck with it.

But yeah, the RB3, 2K11, and AC Brotherhood stats are generally what I was referring to when I said the results were kinda depressing.

I want to see someone insane enough to S-rank Rumble Roses XX.  You would either have to be a sadist or the most insane achievement whore imaginable.  Possibly both.

Anyone know how many people have attached their steam/xbox accounts so that I have some kind of starting point to understand these numbers better?

The least played game on my S-RANK list is Blood Drive with 90 players...it's understandable because it is fucking terrible. I think you'll have a hard time finding anything less than that!

I knew about the existence of Minesweeper Flags, but assumed that it was an Xbox Live Indie Game.

@YoungFrey: The Otamedius game is kinda cheating since it appears to be a Japanese version. But yeah, Brunswick Bowling with 15 is pretty crazy.

I wonder if something like Mass Effect 2 or MW shows a decrease because more players switched to the PC versions? Maybe? Possibly? 
I also wonder what type of games the GB community tends to go for. Not surprised with something like Shadow Complex because that game got a lot of positive things about it from the crew. 
 
Great stats :)

Rock Band 3 is ridiculously hard to find. That may be part of the problem. I couldn't find a keyboard anywhere either, and that kept me away from the game for awhile too. I probably never would have bought it if I wasn't already over $300 deep in DLC haha 
 
EDIT: Also, every time I finish I song it always tells me you beat me by like 1000 points, and that is annoying as hell!

@MideonNViscera said:

EDIT: Also, every time I finish I song it always tells me you beat me by like 1000 points, and that is annoying as hell!

That's okay. It always tells me Discore is better.

Nice stats. I'm really bad about getting just 1 achievement in a fighting game.

it's mods like you that make this site as great as it is

If it makes you feel any better, I plan to pick up RB3 next month (just the disc, mind... can't afford any newfangled non-guitar instruments), and AC:B after I finally get around to finishing AC2.