Why Game Developers Should Support OS X and Linux

kevind23 writes "Although Mac OS X and Linux have a small (but growing) market share, Jeff from Wolfire Games argues that supporting non-Windows platforms can lead to a huge increase in game sales. Using their popular game Lugaru as an example, he shows how less-popular platforms, or more specifically, their userbase can be a powerful advertising force. This can lead to a dramatic increase in popularity and exposure, which usually means a large boost in overall sales. The short article is an interesting read, especially for those working in game development and sales."

Comments

Mac users spend more money

[Senes]

I remember it being drilled into my head over and over... develop for new hardware instead of old hardware, do everything for the expensive crowd because people who don't spend money on their hardware are less likely to spend money on software. This might be an outdated school of thought, but I'd say it goes double for Mac users. They're really expensive, and especially nowadays they're taking on this image as a trendy status symbol instead of a tool to do work with. Another things Mac devs have going for them, there is a lot less competition. If you would say that Macs don't have enough games out for them, then that translates into a niche to fill for aspiring businessmen.

Re:Mac users spend more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Another things Mac devs have going for them, there is a lot less competition. If you would say that Macs don't have enough games out for them, then that translates into a niche to fill for aspiring businessmen.

You clearly have no idea about game marketing. The people who hold the money in gaming are all about avoiding risk by stampeding to the same place as everyone else. Most of the last 15 years, I've been working on games that were just like whatever was popular the year before.

It's like a nature documentary I saw last week that showed zebras crossing a river in Africa. They all mill around for ages, until one finally crosses alone. If that one doesn't get eaten by the crocodiles, they all pour across in exactly the same place.

Re:Mac users spend more money

[SanityInAnarchy]

The people who hold the money in gaming are all about avoiding risk by stampeding to the same place as everyone else.

Except in 2008, apparently. We got Mirror's Edge, Spore, and Dead Space, all from EA.

And don't forget, Portal came from Valve. Shows how if you really want to test an idea without too much risk, build a smaller game and use digital distribution.

Re:Mac users spend more money

[Zephiris]

Spore and Dead Space are both fairly conventional when broken down. Dead Space gives a fairly interesting UI, but by-the-numbers story, standard-but-laggier-than-usual graphics, uninspired audio. Spore is a few minigames that have no real depth, and even the developers admit they're just like stripped down, simplistic versions of other EA/Maxis classics. Also, both heavily pirated as far as the news goes.
And Mirror's Edge isn't out yet for PC. We're talking about PCs on a Windows/Mac/Linux story, yes? :b I hope Mirror's Edge is good, but you can reasonably guarantee now that if it's an EA game (Mercenaries 2 also sadly comes to mind), it's surprisingly conventional no matter how much hype is applied, expensive, and DRM-laden.

Re:Mac users spend more money

[Creepy]

First off, I believe FIFA 08 made EA more money than Madden, but maybe you mean in the US.

Innovation is a high risk, high reward can bring profits - look at the Wii console - the least technically complex, the worst graphics of the major consoles, and the last to market - not to mention it isn't even the cheapest anymore (the XBox 360 cheapest model is under $200), but it dominates the sales charts. Meanwhile, Sony is bleeding money and laying off (and Microsoft is laying off to protect their bottom line).

However, innovation only sells some of the time - Assassin's Creed was one of the top sellers on PS3 and XBox 360 and had a fair degree of innovation and a fair degree of evolution. Call of Duty 4 was also a top seller on those platforms and was mostly evolution. Why does CoD4 sell? First off, as far as shooters go, it is fairly simple to learn and play. Second, people are familiar with the game and controls from the previous games and there is less learning curve. Finally, the plot/fun factor of the game has been good enough that players don't have burnout (like the Tomb Raider franchise). Sports games benefit from having a head start, which is why they sell well - the buyers are nearly always fans that know the rules from watching sports. FIFA 08 isn't as popular as Madden in the US because the US is much more rabid fans of Football than Soccer, while the world audience is just the opposite. NHL games are probably very popular in Canada and the US, but I bet you could sell more copies of Kangaroo Hunter (yes, I made that up) in Australia than NHL games, even if KH used a 6 year old engine and played like crap).

What do many Wii games and Portal have in common? They are deceptively simple - easy to learn, but difficult to master. Wii's dumbing down of the controller to 2 buttons means non-hardcore gamers have a basic learning curve of minutes, not hours or days. And they're mostly fun, or at least the few I've played were. Most of the time I'm fighting with the controls with games on the XBox 360 and PS3 and play against people that have used them for years and it tends to be more an exercise in frustration.

OGL vs DirectX

[im_thatoneguy]

I think it's pretty simple.

Developers like DirectX.

Developers who develop DirectX Products don't always feel the desire to maintain a DirectX and OGL render pipeline.

Apple 3D Card selection have been historically pretty worthless. Linux is infamous for its 3D Card support.

So not only do developers need an openGL renderer but they also have to develop for a less refined driver base.

Re:OGL vs DirectX

[kazade84]

DirectX forms a very small part of any well designed game. Everything would be abstracted for portability, you think the PS3 supports DX?

Let's just go through the thought process of porting a game that supports Windows to Linux MacOSX, starting from a DX only codebase.

It would be trivial to support OpenGL as a 2nd renderer as well as D3D because, as I said, games are designed for portability, but as you pointed out that's more maintenance.

But then why keep D3D? OpenGL is portable and runs on Linux, Windows and OSX so the logical decision would be to ONLY support OpenGL, suddenly the game becomes more portable.

Then there are the other things that DirectX does that need to be duplicated for other platforms, for example input, sound etc. The logical choice would be to use, I dunno, some libraries that already took care of the work, like SDL (windowing, input and events) and OpenAL (sound).

But wait. If you use SDL + OpenAL then suddenly the game runs on all platforms... then what's the point of a DX version?

The point I'm getting at is if a game developer wanted to support the 3 main PC platforms they could do with the same amount of development work. The reasons they don't are:

1. They already have a whole DX tool chain built on Windows and with the blessing of Microsoft. It is a risk for them to change their whole process, what if it doesn't pay off?

2. There WILL be more testing required. Chances are things would work the same as all platforms but they'd still have to test that.

There are of course some advantages to writing for more platforms:

1. Compiling your code with more than one compiler is good practice because it flags up bad code that your original compiler allowed erroneously

2. Parts of the code that aren't abstract enough will be flagged up pretty quickly.

Anyway I'm waffling. The point is, the studios won't change until the increase in market share makes up for the change in their development processes.

Re:OGL vs DirectX

[SanityInAnarchy]

Developers like DirectX.

Not all developers. In fact, historically, there's the classic Carmack attack on DirectX. There was certainly a period of time for which OpenGL was faster.

Apple 3D Card selection have been historically pretty worthless. Linux is infamous for its 3D Card support.

Neither of which matters -- if your game only runs on the very latest, $500 worth of SLI goodness, with more RAM on the video card than a computer had two years ago, you're targeting a much smaller audience than Linux or OS X users.

Your pipeline should be able to scale, both up and down, especially if you intend to use that engine for other games in the future. And, looking up, this is another point in favor of OpenGL -- DirectX 10 currently runs on exactly one platform (Vista), which is perhaps the most universally hated platform since Windows ME, maybe even Microsoft Bob. Even if you're only going to be targeting older versions of Windows, with OpenGL, it's up to the manufacturers, and they tend to keep at least 2K and XP up to date with GL support.

The other funny part of this is that Linux video support actually has more working than OS X, as far as I can tell -- SLI on nvidia, for example.

So not only do developers need an openGL renderer but they also have to develop for a less refined driver base.

Once they've got an OpenGL renderer, I'll argue that they don't need a DirectX one. And you need a less refined driver base anyway, unless you force everyone to upgrade to Vista + SLI/Crossfire + OMGULTRABBQ 3000 PCI-EXPRESS.

Re:Summary of TFA

[Anonymous Coward]

'Because I said so and I know I'm right. If you don't agree with me you're an idiot for caring more about the 89% of PC users who aren't using a Mac or Linux.'

I don't remember him suggesting that one neglect Windows users, rather simply that one should refrain from neglecting non-Windows users

Re:Blizzard

[Kalriath]

Why? No one takes online petitions seriously, it's just a waste of time. Besides, it aint "only fair" that Linux be supported - what's that shit about?

For now, the games work fine under WINE (which is more than can be said for anything EA), isn't that enough for now? If you want to see game companies developing natively for *nix, get more people using it. The developers will follow, seriously.

TINSTAAFL

[Serious Callers Only]

As a user, that is one thing I really hate about the Mac. It's not that I don't believe in paying for software, just that I don't think every little file management tool or MP3 player needs to ask $20. Put up a donation page and be grateful someone hasn't replaced you already.

As a user, that's one thing I hate about other computer users - they expect people to do lots of work for them for free, and feel entitled to it somehow. You should be grateful many people are producing software for you, not coming out with bullshit like 'and be grateful someone hasn't replaced you already'.

Your attitude leads directly to plentiful releases of low-quality, just-good-enough software, many with bundled advertising and malware, much like the Windows software scene in fact. TINSTAAFL.

There is plenty of free open-source software on OS X if that's what you're looking for, it isn't magically turned into shareware - there's tons of Unix software available for free via macports for example, there's also GUI apps like Cyberduck, Audacity, Handbreak, GIMP, etc etc. Then OS X itself bundles tons of open-source software (apache, gcc, etc).

There is also some quality software (like TextMate, or BBEdit) which should continue to charge for development, because development takes time, effort and money.

Re:TINSTAAFL

[Anonymous Coward]

its not bullshit, your obviously a mac user that isnt aware of the array of high quality freeware available on pc that isnt available to you...
overall mac is between 2-3% of all the computers on the face of the planet. the rest are windows machines. if your writing software, where do you want it to go? 97-87% of market? or 2-3%?

also - linux cant replace windows. Im a musician and a gamer. linux is useless for both. if I could replace windows with linux id do it in a second without thinking about it...

Re:TINSTAAFL

[techprophet]

Wrong. That number is over 2 years old. It is 15-20% now. WTF? Linux can do music even better than windows! Ever heard of JACK? How about MIDI? Audacity? Ardour? Zynaddsubfx? Wine (flstudio runs great in it)? I use Windows for games unless there is a native client or it is an oldie. Most pre-2005 games will run in Wine well.

Re:Blizzard

[mstroeck]

I actually prefer it the way it is. Keeps the WINE developers on their toes - and that's way more important than having native WoW.

OSX should do more to support game developers

[SpazmodeusG]

Seriously Apple doesn't do as much to support game developers as Microsoft does.
The Microsoft DirectX SDK has demo applications, a bunch of sounds, models and textures that can be used for non-commercial purposes etc.
Apple has no specific game development library and they don't do anything to support the open source game libraries that fill that void - SDL for example.
The most they have is a small area on their developers website that has a handful of tutorials. It just doesn't cut it compared to what Microsoft does to encourage all types of game developers.
Every game platform i know of has a game development toolkit that helps programmers out. From all the consoles through to the various versions of Windows. Apple has yet to release anything of the sort.

Re:Maybe there's more to it

[Yvanhoe]

The article is its own proof : Because of its linux port, it got an article on Slashdot frontpage for a game that would otherwise go totally unnoticed !

Re:Who'd have thought it?

[Computershack]

Probably because it's bullshit.

Simple solution.

[LWATCDR]

Get out XCode and write your own. Problem solved.
I hear this all the time but it is at best rude. It takes a lot of work to write a good text editor, file management tool, or mp3 player. Some people want to do it for free and put it out under GPL. That is great. I have released GPL code myself. Some people want to get paid for their hard work. I am also all for that. If you like their product pay for it.
If you don't like their product enough to pay them what they ask then DON"T USE IT AND DON"T COMPLAIN.
There is a lot of Free as in beer and Free as in speech software for the Mac. The reason that you probably see more shareware for the Mac may be that Mac users are more willing to support those that write for their machine. Maybe Mac users don't think of programmers as slaves that should produce free software and be grateful that we are willing to use the fruit of their labors.

Macs need to have better video card / hardware and

[Joe The Dragon]

Macs need to have better video card / hardware and a $2300 tower with a lower mid-range card as the base will not do it. A $130 cost of the base card + $150 for a 8800GT makeing it $280 for a 8800gt does not help.

Putting 9400m in the mini and macbook helps make them better but the mini needs to have a faster cpu + 256 - 512 of video ram that is not part of system ram and maybe a faster 3.5 hd. Also put in a 9500 / 9600 in the higher end systems. The imac needs to have system better video card and not a small video card bump that also comes with a bigger screen that makes you trun down the screen size to run games at good settings.

Where is the mac tower? maybe a $1200 - $1500+ base core i7 system with SLI / crossfire on the higher end? With a $2700+ 2 cpu core i7 mac pro. The Dual core i7 systems will likely cost more then to days dual Exon's and a mac pro tower staring at $2700+ will look bad next to a $600 - $900 mini with a slow cpu + 9400 video useing system ram with a 2.5 laptop hd. Other system at $800 - $900 have pci-e slots and or video cards with there own ram.

Also the $2000 mac book pro is lacking in video power next to other laptops that have 9700 / 9800 cards in them some even have sli at the same price or lower and they have 4gb of ram some even have a faster cpu as well.

Apple will have to deal with better EFiX and Psystar system and if the new mini comes with no firewire, mini DP need apple wants you to pay $30 - $100 more for the Mini DisplayPort to DVI Adapter or the Mini DisplayPort to DVIDL Adapter, 9400m video that uses system ram.

1 more thing there better not be a intel atom based mini at $500+ as that will be slower then to days mini even if they put 9400m video on it and that will just say to Psystar we can't beat you in hardware but we can try in court.

Completely UNTRUE

[cybrthng]

Consoles prove my point entirely. Ports of games that are on all consoles tend to suck because there is no polish. Work that could have been spent on the game; making it better, faster, fancier or simply more playable is spent on the process of porting - to platforms in which bugs may not be reproducible at all. A variety of OS's, hardware configurations, kernel schedulers, drivers and whatnot doesn't make a game better. Just means more people, increased costs, more delays and less features.

Re: Dead Space

[Anonymous Coward]

Dead Space desperately wanted to be both Bioshock and Resident Evil 4 in space at the same time, not exactly innovative.

And System Shock 2 did it better with more primitive graphics nearly a decade earlier.