2008 State of Game Development Survey Results Published
Finally, some hard numbers to fuel the fires of purists...
Quote:
SAN FRANCISCO — Aug. 13, 2008 — Game Developer Research has published its seventh report, the 2008 State Of Game Development Survey. The in-depth 180-page report was compiled by surveying almost 2,000 video game professionals from North America and beyond who read Gamasutra.com or subscribe to Game Developer magazine.
The report includes answers to more than 55 questions about the platforms Western game creators develop for, the market sectors they are working in, the tools they use, and the amount of money they spend on them. Some of the highlights of the report which Game Developer Research is revealing to the public at this time include:
Overall, 70% of those replying are making games on the PC or Mac, with 43% creating for console and 28% for web platforms - with just 16% making games for handheld platforms such as the DS or PSP.
This is about as definitive as you can get - 70% of respondents are developing for the PC or Mac, while 43% are developing for consoles. Those who claim the PC is dead or on its last legs may want to wrap their heads around these numbers - the facts, if you will.
You can check out the rest of the press release after the jump.
SAN FRANCISCO — Aug. 13, 2008 — Game Developer Research has published its seventh report, the 2008 State Of Game Development Survey. The in-depth 180-page report was compiled by surveying almost 2,000 video game professionals from North America and beyond who read Gamasutra.com or subscribe to Game Developer magazine.
The report includes answers to more than 55 questions about the platforms Western game creators develop for, the market sectors they are working in, the tools they use, and the amount of money they spend on them. Some of the highlights of the report which Game Developer Research is revealing to the public at this time include:
Overall, 70% of those replying are making games on the PC or Mac, with 43% creating for console and 28% for web platforms - with just 16% making games for handheld platforms such as the DS or PSP.
Of the surveyed console developers, which represent a notable cross-section of the entire industry, 73% are creating games for Xbox 360, 58% (including some of the same respondents) for the PlayStation 3, and 42% for the Wii - with 15% still creating games for the PlayStation 2. This implies that the greatest amount of Western console developers by sheer numbers are creating games for Microsoft's console - but due to team size differences, this doesn't necessarily imply that more games will appear on the Xbox 360 than other consoles.
Again, of the largely North American and European developers surveyed, Nintendo DS had the largest amount of creators by numbers, with 75% of those handheld developers surveyed making games for it - and with 45% making games for the PSP.
The report also discusses trends in programming language. Of those responding, 76% are currently using C++ to make games, with 31% using C#, and 19% using Java/J2ME in their programming efforts. In addition, 9% of those replying still use assembly language in some way.
The remainder of the survey offers data on the purchasing habits and development choices of the game development industry, with market share information in areas as diverse as AI tools, game engines, 3D art software, compilers, books, motion capture suites, and computer hardware - covering every submarket of purchases made by game makers. Game Developer Research expects the report to be of interest to technology companies in the game development space, as well as those looking to enter the market or to survey general game industry trends.
“Our goal at Game Developer Research is always to arm the industry with the knowledge necessary to continue pushing the boundaries of game development,” said Simon Carless, publisher of Game Developer magazine. “We hope that companies already succeeding in or looking to enter the game technology space find the report to be an integral tool for growth.”
Not to simply be a contrarian, but indy games are always on PC as a primary platform for starting developers.
The primary market for magazines like Game Developer are amateurs and pros-in-training. Hell the primary market for the GDC are learning professionals to network with big developers.
When your survey group is new developers, your server group includes more PC developers than console ones (as most game design schools have focused on PC game programming first over the last few years at least). This lends to some solidly skewed results.
I'm not saying PC development is worth, but this data isn't too sound.
A good amount of those PC developers are making crappy web based games and adventure games that 6 people are going to play, like Limbo of the Lost. It's easier to say that you're a PC developer because for a good amount of it you don't really need to get a publisher behind you.
If you lessened the percentage to PC developers who have published games in stores, the number would be far less IMO. Then if you lessened it to PC exclusive developers whose games make even close to the same amount of an average console developers game, your list would have like 3 dev studios on it.
You also have to assume that a large percentage of those PC developers are console developers who are multi-platform. A real test is to look at the lack of interesting PC titles at the top of the sales charts. Blizzard games, Sims games, and a couple of top selling multiplatform games. And every once and awhile there's a Soccer or Nancy Drew game that slips in. The PC games market overall is pretty pathetic at the moment.
Those numbers make my head hurt. So some of the people developing for Xbox 360 are also developing for PS3 but then they don't say if any of those same people are developing for any other platform.
For example: based on this reading if you didn't know anything about the industry you'd never know GH was released for 360, Wii, PS3 and now the DS. The easy assumption to make is that everyone loves the 360. It was either on the 360 and maybe on the PS/3. Or it was only on the Wii, or only on the DS, etc.
A bunch of folks really like the PS3 and some of those also love the 360.
The only way these figures are much help at all is to findout which developers are targeting a specific platform EXCLUSIVELY.
Also, since it is a break down of people, rather than product or studio that further skews the numbers.
Aren't the teams that make PS/3 games at least as large as 360 games? Does the Wii stink so bad that less than half of the people are developing for it? Is the DS or PSP so hard to work with or so unprofitable that no one likes to work with those?
Plus it doesn't give any context with revenue numbers. Professionally developed Web games on a decent portal and DS games tend to make a shitload on a per developer basis, but those are two of the smallest categories listed.
Honestly, besides attempting to step on some fanatics nerves, I am not sure there is any real data here, can anyone point it out to me and how you might use this?
Only thing I can come up with is "Wow, look how low some of those numbers are, maybe the Wii/DS/PSP/Web is an untapped market!" To which I reply "Duh".
This is about as definitive as you can get - 70% of respondents are developing for the PC or Mac, while 43% are developing for consoles. Those who claim the PC is dead or on its last legs may want to wrap their heads around these numbers - the facts, if you will.
Bapenguin says "no" fitty. Quit stirring that pot.
You guys...are arguing about this?
LOL I can't believe some of you guys are serious. :P
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Those numbers make my head hurt. So some of the people developing for Xbox 360 are also developing for PS3 but then they don't say if any of those same people are developing for any other platform.
Often they aren't. You have a team working on 360/PS3 and then the Wii port is farmed out to smaller team of a third party that specializes on the Wii.
This isn't a count of total games, just the people needed to make the games.
Quote:
Originally Posted by vallor
Aren't the teams that make PS/3 games at least as large as 360 games?
Not necessarily. The team may be primarily working on the 360, and specifically the content guys (artist/designers) can be working on only that platform. Then a small programming team handles making sure everything is running on PS3 with a few content guys checking the results on the platform to make sure they are both looking as expected.
This is how a lot of PS2/Xbox development worked, but in that case everyone was on the PS2 with a handful of guys on the xbox.
Quote:
Originally Posted by vallor
Does the Wii stink so bad that less than half of the people are developing for it?
Wii is too unpredictable with 3rd party software to justify large teams. Also much of the reason why game teams have gotten so big is that making high level art assets is really time consuming. Assets the Wii doesn't need.
Look at the big sellers on the Wii, WiiPlay and WiiFit. Visually these games are very simple. Why spend $20m on a title on the Wii when a $5m title will likely sell just as well.
With publishers still confused on how to address the Wii market successfully it makes more sense to just spam the platform with cheap titles and see what sticks.
Once people consistently know what genres/concepts sell well, then we will see a visual arms race on the Wii as titles look to standout from the pack and gain mindshare.
Good god. I loved your acting in Batman returns. Did you actually eat those raw fish? And whats the deal with all the penguins, were they hard to work with or what?
