Horses, Santa Ragione’s 2025 surrealist horror game that was banned from both the Steam and Epic Games storefronts, has left its developer and publisher in a $42,000 hole, according to an official press release provided to Kotaku.
According to Santa Ragione, Horses’ release on GOG, Itch, and Humble netted the studio 30,000 individual sales and accrued roughly $100,000 in revenue. Not bad for a relatively small indie studio and arguably very good for a game that would appeal to a somewhat niche audience, but unfortunately not quite good enough, as only $8,000 of that $100,000 has actually made its way to Santa Ragione.
“In keeping with the transparency that has characterized our communications around Horses, this is a breakdown of how the revenue was distributed,” reads Santa Ragione’s press release. “$30,000 went to the game’s director, Andrea Lucco Borlera, in recognition of years of work on the project; $62,000 went to the game’s private funders, covering their $50,000 investment and providing a return; and $8,000 remains with Santa Ragione, a first step toward recouping the $50,000 of self-funded development costs.”
As confirmed in a follow-up email from Santa Ragione’s co-founder and studio director, Pietro Righi Riva, that leaves the studio in $42,000 worth of debt. That’s a relatively hefty sum for a studio of Santa Ragione’s size, and one that will likely be difficult to recoup considering that Horses’ moment in the spotlight has undoubtedly come and gone.
However, it does leave us with an unanswered follow-up question: could Horses have performed better if it hadn’t been banned from Steam? While it’s impossible to answer, I personally doubt it. To echo the words of Kotaku’s Kenneth Shepard in his review of the game last year, Horses’ 15 minutes of fame was a direct result of its controversial removal from the Steam storefront–and it’s certainly the only reason anyone is still talking about the game in 2026.
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