I'd say even that is generous. Especially once you consider opportunity cost -- length of development, contractor expenses, hardware, lost potential earnings if employed, etc.
My VR game eventually sold 130k copies over four years, but amortized over 1.5 years of development, $100k contracting expenses, $25k hardware, most copies sold at sale price, and another partner to split earnings with I still would have made significantly more as an employed principal or even senior engineer.
As far as indie game success goes, selling this many copies puts me on the far end of the percentile scale. Oof.
There is of course the non-monetary "compensation" aspect. I created something I am truly proud of, tons of people have either seen or played it and enjoyed the experience, and I crossed a huge item off the ol' bucket list. Even if the game had only sold 10k copies, I still would have called it a win personally.
