Source: http://www.hemispheregames.com/2010/06/23/linux-the-numbers/
Indie game studio Hemisphere released a native Linux port of their chilled-out, bacteria-based game Osmos "a little over a month ago." In the article they ask, "is it worth porting games to Linux?" And they answer, "yes."
Their pessimistic estimate of two person-months to complete the port, at a cost of, I guess, no more than $3000 per person-month means that they at least broke even, and probably made a net profit from the port. And that's just within a month of release. Two person-months - seriously, that's nothing. Compare that to my optimistic guesstimate of fifty person-months to develop the game on its original release platform.
They had an advantage that their codebase had been designed to be cross-platform from the get go, but that is something that any game developer worth their salt should be doing nowadays anyway, especially if they are targetting PC and a console, or two or more consoles. Source, UE3 and id Software's engines all have native Linux ports, so any game using one of those engines should be fairly easy to port. They also presumably have the advantage that their codebase is smaller than most mainstream games, but I would expect sales to scale in general, proportionally with code size, so I don't think it's a true advantage.
The article also pointed out a similar trend reported [http://2dboy.com/2009/02/12/world-of-goo-linux-version-is-ready/] by 2D Boy, who released a native Linux port of World of Goo last year.
Both studios also have the advantage that there is probably proportionally more overlap between Linux users and indie game players than there is between Linux users and mainstream game players. But I think this shows that there is profit to be made in targetting Linux, whether the game is indie or mainstream.
I see this as more justification for Valve's confirmation [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/7715209/Steam-for-Mac-goes-live.html] that a native Linux port of Steam is in the works. Hopefully it will silence the claims that there is no market for games on Linux - yes, it may not be as big as for Windows, but it is profitable.
So what do you think? Is all this good for gaming? Is it good for Linux? Is there a point to all this, or is it a big pile of "meh"?
Indie game studio Hemisphere released a native Linux port of their chilled-out, bacteria-based game Osmos "a little over a month ago." In the article they ask, "is it worth porting games to Linux?" And they answer, "yes."
Their pessimistic estimate of two person-months to complete the port, at a cost of, I guess, no more than $3000 per person-month means that they at least broke even, and probably made a net profit from the port. And that's just within a month of release. Two person-months - seriously, that's nothing. Compare that to my optimistic guesstimate of fifty person-months to develop the game on its original release platform.
They had an advantage that their codebase had been designed to be cross-platform from the get go, but that is something that any game developer worth their salt should be doing nowadays anyway, especially if they are targetting PC and a console, or two or more consoles. Source, UE3 and id Software's engines all have native Linux ports, so any game using one of those engines should be fairly easy to port. They also presumably have the advantage that their codebase is smaller than most mainstream games, but I would expect sales to scale in general, proportionally with code size, so I don't think it's a true advantage.
The article also pointed out a similar trend reported [http://2dboy.com/2009/02/12/world-of-goo-linux-version-is-ready/] by 2D Boy, who released a native Linux port of World of Goo last year.
Both studios also have the advantage that there is probably proportionally more overlap between Linux users and indie game players than there is between Linux users and mainstream game players. But I think this shows that there is profit to be made in targetting Linux, whether the game is indie or mainstream.
I see this as more justification for Valve's confirmation [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/7715209/Steam-for-Mac-goes-live.html] that a native Linux port of Steam is in the works. Hopefully it will silence the claims that there is no market for games on Linux - yes, it may not be as big as for Windows, but it is profitable.
So what do you think? Is all this good for gaming? Is it good for Linux? Is there a point to all this, or is it a big pile of "meh"?
