The Games Developers Conference is taking San Francisco by storm in March, allowing the top developers from around the world to meet up under one massive roof. It’s also a great time to get some insight into the industry, with 2000 developers being survey as part of the traditional pre-GDC “State of the Industry” poll. And just like last year, the PC still reigns as favourite.
Out of the 2000 developers interviewed, 56% of them are working on a game for PC, a 3% rise from the same survey last year. A staggering 50% of them are also developing games for mobile, which happens to far outweigh the number of games coming to console. Only 26% of the developers surveyed are making a game for PS4, while 22% are working on ones for the Xbox One. That’s less than half of PC, and nearly as much in comparison to mobile.
That doesn’t mean console development is in a recession though. In fact, the opposite is true. While PC and mobile reigned as favourites, it was the Xbox One and PS4 that showed the most annual growth. During the same survey last year, only 14% of the developers polled were working on PS4 games, while only 12% were working on the Xbox One side. That’s a massive jump in one year, and shows that the new consoles are definitely catching in terms of popularity.
The survey doesn’t only take into account exclusives, which means that a lot of these games could be coming to all platforms. It’s unsurprising to see PC still out in front though. The ease of access that platforms like Steam provide is a huge draw, and one of the reasons the PS4 lost an exclusive title last week. Until consoles have far less legal hops to jump through, I don’t see the favouritism swaying.
As a final kicker, 21% of developers stated that they made most of their profits through microtransactions, a hefty 8% more than those who said the same for retail sales. That’s the state of our industry currently, like it or not.
Last Updated: January 16, 2015
Admiral Chief
January 16, 2015 at 11:37
Well, DUH!
HairyEwok
January 16, 2015 at 12:00
Hold up they prefer PC yet the consoles get more attention.
Admiral Chief
January 16, 2015 at 12:01
Because they blindly spend R800 on games
ToshZA
January 16, 2015 at 12:12
And fewer sales.
Viking Of Science
January 16, 2015 at 12:07
A lot of Indie Devs attend GDC, hence the PC preference….
RinceThis
January 16, 2015 at 12:15
And money…
Hammersteyn
January 16, 2015 at 11:38
I’d love to crush the dinga-ling of King.com with a fucking sledgehammer
Admiral Chief
January 16, 2015 at 11:38
Bah, microtransactions, *spits*
Lord Chaos
January 16, 2015 at 11:39
And yet you repeated the word.
Hammersteyn
January 16, 2015 at 11:40
Agreed
http://media.giphy.com/media/bgTrPHURhqX3W/giphy.gif
Raptor Rants A Lot
January 16, 2015 at 11:43
It came?
ToshZA
January 16, 2015 at 11:43
If that’s what you think a penis looks like, you need to lose some weight…
Hammersteyn
January 16, 2015 at 11:45
Maybe that’s what his penis looks like
ToshZA
January 16, 2015 at 11:45
OH THE IMAGERY.
*Vomits*
Wraith
January 16, 2015 at 13:48
I swear that’s about 7x larger than usual.
Raptor Rants A Lot
January 16, 2015 at 12:31
GG
Hammersteyn
January 16, 2015 at 11:44
Only gif I could find of Kim Khardasian
Raptor Rants A Lot
January 16, 2015 at 12:31
whahahahahahahaha
Admiral Chief
January 16, 2015 at 11:51
Agneemanflipdeon
Hammersteyn
January 16, 2015 at 11:52
It’s mostly water :/
CAE9872
January 16, 2015 at 11:38
Good to see “useless info surveys” are still kicking about. They could have paid me, as a console gamer, to tell them that. It’s cheaper, easier to get onto Steam, easier to change the game, many, many PC gamers out there be it hardcore fans or the less hardcore fans.
RinceThis
January 16, 2015 at 12:18
What you said!
Raptor Rants A Lot
January 16, 2015 at 11:41
So if you actually read in to this, PC uptake for games is slowing down while mobile and console uptake is on the rise
Tarisma
January 16, 2015 at 11:44
Quality trumps quantity every day of the week
ToshZA
January 16, 2015 at 11:44
What happens when (as is the case with PC) a platform has both?
Lord Chaos
January 16, 2015 at 11:53
Then you see what lies behind the wall of sleep.
ToshZA
January 16, 2015 at 11:55
You mean goats, right? *Edit: I read that wrong, but whatever.
http://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/331380/header.jpg?t=1417796174
Aries
January 16, 2015 at 12:55
I also read that wrong, haha
Tarisma
January 16, 2015 at 12:07
Then everyone wins, what I’m saying is for Consoles and PC there is a lot of fluff, how many thousands of games are there available that no one plays?
ToshZA
January 16, 2015 at 12:11
It’s worse on mobile, because there it’s 95% fluff, and 5% quality. And most of the quality are ports from PC or console games.
Tarisma
January 16, 2015 at 12:13
Exactly so its not really how many games are being developed on each platform its how many quality games worth playing are being developed on a platform.
ToshZA
January 16, 2015 at 12:13
I see your point. Slow on the uptake, sorry XD
HairyEwok
January 16, 2015 at 12:08
I had a dream, that one day PC and consoles can live in peace…. Said no gamer ever.
Rock789
January 16, 2015 at 13:55
Sorry… All I read was “Developers still blah blah blah I’m a dirty tramp.” :p **RUNS**
MakeItLegal
January 16, 2015 at 14:55
because u need a pc to build a consul game …go figure