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They leave a gap in the market where a competitor could emerge. EDIT: I know the gap is small, less than 1% but it is still a gap. If a competitor could emerge
by threatripper 7y ago
They leave a gap in the market where a competitor could emerge.
EDIT: I know the gap is small, less than 1% but it is still a gap. If a competitor could emerge in a small gap like this is a question I cannot answer. There is potential for growth (especially if Microsoft slips up heavily which they almost did) but so far that growth hasn't happened and the future is hard to predict.
- ssully 7y agoDo you have any examples where a serious competitor emerged because a game developer didn't support Linux or Mac?
- threatripper 7y agoNone that I know of. Almost all Linux games also support Windows. Steam heavily supports Linux and in their numbers are 0.67% Linux users: https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Software-Survey-Welcome-to-Steam?platform=combined https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Softw... It is rumored that Steam uses Linux for leverage in negotiations with Microsoft. Therefore it may have a big strategic value for them even though the numbers are still so low.
- Macha 7y agoI mean, Valve's Linux support happened because they were spooked by the Windows Store and the idea of a possible future iOS style lockdown leaving them shut out of the market
- speedgoose 7y agoSuperTux and Gnome Mines!
- yyyk 7y agoThe casual link is nigh-impossible to prove. However, Bungie started as a Mac shop, and Stardock started as an OS/2 shop. It's possible to make the claim that had more commercial games been available to these relatively small platforms in the 90s, there wouldn't have been enough space for these game companies to emerge. As I said, I can't prove that. It's quite possible these companies would have been successful anyway.
- Pfhreak 7y agoIt's a really small gap though. Significantly less than 1% of sales gap.
- Kapura 7y agoThe point of dropping support for those platforms is that the market isn't there. There is no gap to fill. There are maybe a few thousand people who will lose the game (unless they use bootcamp or wine). Games cost money to make. If a game doesn't have a chance at breaking even, it needs external funding or free labour to get it made. This is the economic reality of how games get made.
- threatripper 7y agoI don't have good numbers on Linux sales but Rocket League sold over 10 Million copies back in 2017 and Steam had 0.67% Linux users. That would make the estimate 67000 Linux users back then and probably a bit more today. That's probably not enough for a competitor to make any money, especially since they could only catch a part of these users.
- vel0city 7y agoThat 10 million copies includes all the free ones they gave away on the Playstation. That's 10 million copies between Playstation, Xbox, Windows, Mac, and Linux. Some articles state about 40% of users were Playstation users with Steam users only being 30% [0]. Assuming the rates stayed the same and that an even number of Linux users bought the game as Windows (quite an assumption either way on both statistics) that would put the estimate of Linux Rocket League users closer to 20k, or 0.2% of the total purchased base. Overall, all these numbers are old and the final estimates are based on some big assumptions which may or may not be accurate. [0] https://www.gamespot.com/articles/as-rocket-league-turns-one-ps4-remains-its-most-po/1100-6441644/ https://www.gamespot.com/articles/as-rocket-league-turns-one...