Deep sea exploration and restaurant management game Dave the Diver is still going deep: Developer Mintrocket says the game has now moved past 10 million copies sold across all platforms, while the In the Jungle expansion that came out in June has moved past one million sales of its own.
Dave the Diver was an "out-of-nowhere hit" when it arrived in 2023, earning a whopping 91% review score at PC Gamer—a site that does not give out many 90+ scores—and selling more than a million copies in just 10 days. A nomination at the 2023 Game Awards in the Best Indie Game category led to a small spot of controversy: Mintrocket is a division of Nexon, and so very much not an indie studio.
The overall impact seemed minimal, though, in part because Dave the Diver didn't win, but also because game director Jaeho Hwang has been pretty clear that he doesn't think of it as an indie game either.
The fact that Dave the Diver is a really good game that continued to get better with post-launch updates and crossovers that actually made sense is also probably helpful in that regard. In the Jungle, the DLC that came out earlier this year, is a banger in its own right: PC Gamer's Chris Livingston scored it a 90%, declaring it "just as charming and surprising as the base game."
"Everyone here at Mintrocket continues to be blown away by the passion and love that Dave the Diver attracts even years after launch," Hwang said of the big sales milestone. "We are looking forward to expanding the Dave the Diver franchise in the future, including the upcoming cooking simulation and adventure spin-off, Bancho The Chef. We want to thank everyone who has shown their faith in us, and we can’t wait to share our future plans."
Bancho the Chef, a prequel to Dave the Diver, is a cooking simulation adventure game that follows Bancho, the chef at Dave's restaurant, in his younger days, when he was "on the road to becoming a sushi master." A release date hasn't yet been set but it's up for pre-purchase now on Steam.
