North American devs prefer PC and Mobile the most

on an interesting note PS4 is the most developed for next gen console in North America, my god the Wii U is doing terrible, probably part of why it barely has games. I'm sure devs in the rest of the world are developing a lot for the 3DS considering it has much more higher ranked games or Vita simply has more trash.

link

Game developers prefer to make games for the PC, smartphones, and Sony’s PlayStation 4 console over Microsoft’s Xbox One, according to a survey of 2,600 game developers by the Game Developers Conference.

About 20 percent of game developers said that for their next game, they will develop for Sony’s PlayStation, compared to 17 percent for the competing Xbox One and just 4 percent for Nintendo’s Wii U. A year ago, support for the new Wii U was already flagging, and this pretty much doomed it. Nintendo recently acknowledged that the Wii U suffering from weak sales.

Of course they do and that´s only going to increase even further,in both fronts.

I'm not sure being similar to mobile is a good thing...

Bit of a shit survey, they could at least break down the smartphone/tablets by operating system. Also Mac should have been separated too to get more realistic results. And what about Linux and SteamOS.

PS4 is more preferred compared to Xbone. American devs don't like supporting their home country console?

There's Obviously MORE PC's/Tablets/Smartphones worldwide than consoles, of course they would be developed more.

My own country wants to cut costs while raking in maximum profits all while screwing over consumers? Interesting... lol

but seriously... that's sad.

Well, I see PC gaming getting a bit of inflation in 3-4 years time.

Today, we have stuff like full Windows 8.1, 8" tablets rated up to 10 hours that can play some pc games at "desperate" settings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9K9ZMJOPMQ

I think 6-8 inch screens, 768p, medium, 30+ fps with any new multi-platform game available for PC would be acceptable for plenty thus adding some PC active install base.

Growth definitely least from h/w enthusiasts.

Funny how that happens.

It's worth noting that PC actually has over 70% there as browser games are counted as separate category.

Wii U uses a completely different architecture compared to x86 based PS4 and Xbox One. NA devs are trying to increase their profit margins by lowering costs as much as possible, thus why PS4 is so popular.

These statistics are flawed... its like that study last year that showed "Apple was the favourite platform for game developers. Steve Jobs most influential figure in gaming" ... malarky... basically, its every single basement developer... even people like myself who can code very simple games... praising them because its easy to put a s*itty game on their devices at no cost.... or very little.

Anyone on the /Mobiles/Tablets can make a game and host it to the world.... hence why these platforms have tons of the same copy pasted crap.

PC is similar, you wont be on any distro platforms that are not indie though.

Costs nothing to make a game for PC ... so ofcourse it would be highly rated by more devs.

Preferring mobile? Shows you money talks.....but it's a shame. It's like being forced to eat hamburger instead of steak.

Nice to see PS4 as THE preferred console platform.

To be fair, mobile programming is interesting due to hardware that consoles do not have - gyroscope, accelerometer, proximity, light sensor, compass, etc.

Yeah, I wonder who is interested in playing moblie games on PC, like what is happening on Windows 8 lately i.e. ports of mobile games like Spartan Assault...

No, PC is eating steak. Consoles is eating a hamburger and moblie gaming is the equivalent of eating from a dumpster.

Nah.....PC has bugs, glitches, and updates....no steak there. Though to be fair....consoles are headed that way now.

headed that way? they've been that way for a while

Yup, which game launches these day without bugs and glitches. Or without a day one patch ?

Updates aren't that bad. It used to be that you had to search and install them yourself, not that hard but still required some effort. Nowadays services like Steam and Origin do that for you. Heck, steam even updates any mods you have installed through steam workshop.

But we can agree that mobile gaming is the same as eating trash from a dumpster ?

1. xbl/psn updates take longer than steam ones. Installing an xbox one game takes longer than installing skyrim and downloading/installing 3 gigs worth of mods and fixing them.

2. Glitches. Red Ring of Death. Disc Scratching. (arguably worse than simple glitches). lol Skyrim PS3. Except, unlike PC, they aren't fixable.

Oh god, disc scratching. My brother's 360 did that. Ruined a lot of discs :(

less hoops to jump through and cheaper

It's called cash shops.

This is also a good thing, not everyone into game development will get the opportunity to work at a AAA studio since they all require you to have at least 5 years of experience in game development and most likely that experience from another AAA studio and you only get paid about 50k average or whatever depending on the studio and how much the suits hoard money. Plus with all the tools provided in this day in age you can easily start your own career in game development if you can't meet the requirements of AAA or have AAA equipment. Unity released new updates to make 2D development a lot more easier, you can make animations similar to those of motion capture suits by getting some webcams and using software like ipisoft.

Steam is best place to sell indie games on PC and they have greenlight as quality control so none of that generic RPGmaker or Mario copies from game maker or half assed mobile ports get on.

Apple are starting to crackdown on devs a bit after Flappy Bird being taken down and all these shameles devs making direct rip offs.

One problem with indies is that some of them are in the "Desperation Genre" like a games like minecraft and Day Z were so successful now we are suddenly seeing all these other sandbox games and zombie survival games. War Z was a game that took advantage of this. Steam and other app stores need to start cracking down on shameless rip off cash ins. They also need to do something about early access, it's great people can test games and help fund the developers but, some are getting lazy since they got the money already and since it's "alpha" they can't get the whip cracked on them for having glitchy games. Too many early access games are taking up the front page some don't even need to be early access like ubisofts upcoming game or Hawken and GunZ 2 which are both F2P games. Games like Asseto Corsa and Next Car game and doing wonderfully on early access but valve needs to start putting more limits on early access like only certain amount of copies can be sold or a time limit of how long it can be on early access.

A game a couple of my friends play on steam is called Cook, Serve, Delicious. It was a mobile game at first but best the developer made $1,500 a month on iphone, he made about $15,000 on ipad, a little on android, but he had to cancel development for an iphone since the memory limits were too much. He got his game greenlit on steam and in the first 8 hours he made $50,000, much more than what he was making on mobiles.

I don't know what that game is, but it's not the memory limitations that make mobile gaming worthless for me.

It's the control limitations. You have such limited options, you have tapping, and you have swiping. You can't build complex games with those.

Look at Godus for example. It was stated on their Kickstarter that this would be the glorious return of God games. But I was skeptical from the very beginning as they were making it with iPhone in mind. And yeah: as it turned out, you can't make a good God game when you have such limited controls. It's nothing like the old God Games Molyneux used to make. It's crap.

I'm not saying nobody is interested in playing mobile games on PC (I'm sure many people love angry birds on PC) it's just that most PC gamers are looking for something more than clicking and swiping with the mouse. Like actual deeper gameplay.

More and more developers are deciding that it's easier to feed their families if they make money.

@summerparadise said:

Titanfall looks much better than people give it credit for. It's textures are its weakest link but it has some incredible sights to see. I was more visually impressed playing Titanfall than I was playing Killzone Shadow Fall. Big epic battles with stuff happening all around me was a lot more visually appealing than looking at an NPC unnaturally close to my character. The lighting also isn't overdone in lens flares like every other modern game though it badly needs a colour boost

Ejecting from a Titan and seeing the battle rage on underneath and seeing the sprawling backdrops is really cool