The Exit 8 Passes 3 Million Sales — The Tiny Horror Game Is Now a Movie, Manga and Novel Franchise

The Exit 8 has sold more than 3 million copies worldwide. Publisher PLAYISM and developer KOTAKE CREATE confirmed the milestone on September 7, marking roughly another million units sold in the year since the game passed 2 million in August 2025.

The Numbers So Far

Milestone	When
Original Steam release	November 29, 2023
1 million units	August 2024
1.4 million units	January 2025
2 million units	August 29, 2025
3 million units	September 7, 2026

PLAYISM hasn’t broken the total down by platform or region, so treat 3 million as the confirmed worldwide units-sold figure — not players, downloads, or a number combined with any other game.

What The Exit 8 Actually Is

The Exit 8 is a short walking simulator from solo developer KOTAKE CREATE, playable in well under an hour. You’re placed in an endless, tiled Japanese underground passageway and have to spot subtle “anomalies” — something out of place or missing — to find the real Exit 8 and escape; miss one and the loop resets. It first launched on Steam in November 2023 and has since come to Switch, Switch 2, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and mobile via the App Store and Google Play.

To mark the milestone, PLAYISM is running a commemorative sale on the game across every platform except the PlayStation Store, alongside a week-long ad takeover on Shibuya’s Dogenzaka Happy Board billboard starting September 7.

Not the Same Number as Platform 8

KOTAKE CREATE’s 2024 follow-up, Platform 8 (8番のりば), is included in the same commemorative sale but is a separate release with its own sales total — the 3 million figure belongs to The Exit 8 alone, and PLAYISM hasn’t published a combined number for both games.

From Indie Game to Film, Manga and Novel

The Exit 8 has grown well beyond the original game since its last sales milestone. A live-action film adaptation, directed by Genki Kawamura for Toho and starring Kazunari Ninomiya, premiered at Cannes’ Midnight Screenings before opening in Japan on August 29, 2025 — the same day as the game’s 2 million announcement. A manga adaptation by Tamura Mitsuhisa, published by Shogakukan, ran as a complete one-volume series. Kawamura also wrote a tie-in novel, published by Suirinsha in summer 2025 ahead of the film’s release, expanding on scenes the movie didn’t have room for. None of these projects were announced as a factor in the game’s own sales growth — PLAYISM’s statement covers unit sales only.

The Bottom Line

Three million copies is a big number for a $3.99 game built by one developer, and it’s still climbing alongside a film, a manga, and a novel that didn’t exist the last time PLAYISM updated this figure. What isn’t confirmed is when the next milestone announcement comes, or how much of the growth traces back to the movie versus the game finding new players on its own.