this may of been discussed before but in my time here i've never seen a question like the one i'm about to pop out with. so why don't developers / publishers release games on ALL hardware? i'm going to use Mortal Kombat 9 here as its the most recent example i can think of. it's been released on the PS3 and Xbox 360, but not the PC. don't get me wrong i'm not against the fact it's not hit the PC, personally i see no point in it. but what i'm wondering is why not do it anyway? surely the cost to port it over is less than the income you would gain from the PC game market. fair play MK9 would be pretty horrible on the PC unless you used a gamepad, which is why it's on consoles, but coming from a profit point of view, i'm wondering why they don't bother with PC. not everyone plays consoles which is pretty obvious asking the devoted PC gamers. and fair play to the small games which are realistically made for only one certain platform, but the big companies can surely expand into other platforms. not only would they gain more profit but it would also please consumers who only have say a maxed out PC because they saved money not buying consoles. not sure if this is an argument or a question but the main point i was trying to figure out was, do developers have any reason NOT to release games on all platforms? (ignoring exclusive games here though, i mean games that often just hit consoles or just PC's)
I believe that companies like Sony and Microsoft pay the developers to develop/release it to consoles, and at the same time telling them not to release to any other hardware.
Publishers blames on pirating... but the reality of things, and publishers knows that, they just don't want to say it, is that Microsoft and Sony pays A LOT of money to teh pushers for exclusivity... or "Here is a briefcase of money... if you don't release the game on PC and especially not on Wii". Probably Microsoft said: Not on Wii, and we want a delay release for the PC if they are plans for it, and Sony wanted their console only... so an agreement of PS3 and XBox 360 exclusive was done.
that's not true. why would both companies join forces to gang up on the PC? Fighting games rarely get released for the pc simply because unless you have a controller, it's not easy to do the moves. There is also the fact that fighting game fans primarily reside on the consoles. tl;dr- fighting games on PC are like RTS games on consoles.
Er.. No a company pays either MS or Sony to A) develop for the machine and B) buy a dev kit so they can.
Fighthing games are made with consoles in mind, first or the controls and second because the players who play combat games are in consoles, fighthing each other, in the same room, its with this in mind that this games are made. Ofc now days you can easily find a controller for the pc, but the market isnt there, it would be a waste.
only used MK9 as a reference cause it's an example of a game which could easily be ported to the PC but isn't. of course it was made for consoles, and i'm buying it for my xbox in the next few days, was just making the point that if it was shoved on the PC too theres extra profit, even if it is a bit strange on the PC. then again, Street Fighter did all right on the PC in sales.
My theory is that perhaps you underestimate the cost of porting a game to PC. Oh and PC gamers bitch a lot more than console players (and rightfully so). They can't rip off us as easily as they do with console kids so they just don't bother most of the time.
you're probably right, i have no idea how much it would cost to port it over. i just find it hard to believe that the profit could be lower than the time to port it. i mean surely it can't take that long to port a game over?
I see, but then Im thinking that maybe more games than you think are ported to PC, Dead Space comes to mind (and every EA Sports game) so I think we are understamating the cost of making a port and other aspects that could suffer if the port its of poor quality (EA Sports videosgames on consoles have great reviews and are well made, while on PC they are just rushed and poor made with old graphics or anything, making look the franchise bad maybe?). So I think there's actually a lot to think about when you gonna make a port before it actually turns into some extra profit.
Licensing for a platform and (timed) exclusivity contracts are separate things and they both exist. If you want to see an example, just look up how Microsoft got timed exclusivity for GTA IV DLC.
The amount of testing required on a PC port would be monumental compared to console. Every console, has the same hardware/software. Every PS3 is the same, and every xbox is the same. So testing is relatively easy compared to PC, where there are millions of types of hardware/software combinations. And, of course, as with everything, I'm sure money must have something to do with it,
I imagine the porting to take a long time, based on the fact that most of the time my games tell me to press X,Y,B,A to continue. If devs don't have time to change that then they must be up against it. I do see this as a good thing though, atleast they let you know you are playing a console port. I would imagine the market has a lot to do with the decision not to port a certain game/genre.
I hate this too. For instance, Killzone 3 I would've bought straight away had it been on PC. I'm not going to buy a console just to play one game though and we all know that playing FPSs on consoles is like trying to shave using a blunt pencil. I will admit some some games are just 'suited' to consoles, but at least give us a damn choice on which platform to play on. Also, there should be a law forbidding the release of a gaming series that has only the first one or two episodes on all platforms. You know who you are. Punishment should be something extraordinarily painful. In summary: Consoles: Fighting games, driving games, platformers. PC: FPSs, RPGs, RTSs, flight/space sims
Its down to these reasons I believe: Costs - The cost/profit ratio of developing+support of PC to console is much lower, due to different hardware/software configurations in the pc whereas console is just 1 setup, which is easier to develop, test and provide support for. And of course console market is much bigger than PC so more sales there. Less work - As said above you need to put in more work for a PC release, so getting more money for less work. Exclusivity - Developer studios get nice fat contracts from Microsoft and Sony to be exclusive to their consoles. PC does not offer that. Perceived piracy - piracy is easier on PC which is true, but again developers like to think piracy on PC is rife while there is none on consoles. Again this links into less work, by implementing incentives for people to not pirate their games, piracy will be cut, but they do not want to put the extra effort and work into doing this. I personally would prefer it if developers would not release PC versions if they want to be lazy and implement poor console ports with crappy post release support....eyes looking at you treyarch.
Just saying... Consoles are no slouch when it comes to RPGs. Both do platforms do them as good as the other.
True, but only when the RPG system is pared down slightly for the controller. I like PC RPG's simply because you have much more hotkey customisation so can bring your magic/powers/attacks etc to bear much faster. That and modding, RPG's are always begging to be modded. Unfortunately the porting of RPG's sometimes results in less that stellar graphics(I'm looking at you Mass Effect 2 NPC textures)
While I would agree that porting to PC is probably more painless than say, porting to the Wii, us PC gamers aren't exactly forgiving of ported games which haven't received extra man-hours.
