In a continuation of my Mistakes Indie Game Developers Make post series, I have a new one that I see developers make that is a surefire killer of any game. In today’s multi platform world, every platform is a potential market and fan base that can either grow or die because of a bad port.
Porting Practices:
Porting refers to releasing a game onto multiple platforms. For multiple consoles, most often the original developer will do it themselves. But if the developer is too busy or not versed in the other platforms, they may hire a third party to handle the port.
The other situation and the one that this post will focus on is porting from console to PC or vice-versa. Consoles for the most part are standardized in their setup; it’s not like there are 20 different versions of the Xbox One or PS4 to worry about. This is why it’s easier to do multi-game releases on the consoles with exception to porting to the Wii-U due to the different configuration and control setup.
The PC is not so lucky. Everyone has a different setup and there are so many variables that make it hard to work on. Drivers, Video Cards, memory, monitors and so on all have to be accounted for when releasing a PC game. Because of this, most console developers will turn to a third party to handle the porting of their game so they don’t have to deal with all the different issues of the pc.
But as today’s example will show, you need to be careful with who you go with and the quality of the work.
Porting Problems:
Netherealm Studios has had an impressive run with their recent fighting games. MK 9, MK X and Injustice have all done well on the consoles. However, each game has been met by problems on the PC front in no small part thanks to the developer they work with: High Voltage. High Voltage has worked on the as mentioned games for their PC release and each one has had problems. MK9 had netcode issues, Injustice had frame rate problems and MK 10 at the moment had crashing, memory leaks, netcode complaints, frame rate and even players losing their save files.
MK X might have been an amazing game, but the porting job and support for the PC has been less than ideal.
Besides the issues from a technical standpoint with PC development, there is also the cost as it will require additional money to work on getting a port just right.
With MK 9 and Injustice, High Voltage left both titles in an unfinished porting state and this is what has a lot of fans worried about MK X.
MK X is a popular game, but it’s a popular game on the consoles and where Netherealm is dedicating their time and energy to. Right now for fans of fighting games who bought MK X for the PC, they are stuck in a purgatory in a manner of speaking hoping that the game they bought will be fixed.
There are plenty of cases where a developer will not take the time to properly design their game for a new platform. This could be everything from not changing the UI to fit the different platform to literally using another platform’s control scheme for all tool-tips.
Many smaller developers will give their game to a third party developer when they don’t want to focus on it themselves. But herein lies the problem with not adequately dedicating the resources to get your game working on a new platform; you’re losing out on fans and market space.
Cut and Run:
A basic economic lesson is that the more markets that your product is available in, the greater potential there is for profit. When a developer doesn’t spend the time making their game work on another platform, it does both short and long term damage to their brand and game.
Getting your game on as many platforms as possible is a major part of having a success and why porting is done frequently on AAA titles.
Fumbling a potential market and fanbase for your game is never a good thing and you never know where you’ll find a new source of fans for your title and company.
My favorite example would be Banjo and Kazooie Nuts and Bolts which did the vehicle sandbox and design gameplay long before the likes of favorites like Kerbal Space Program and Besieged. If that would have came to the PC, it could have sold a lot better for being the first game to market with that design.
Releasing a bad port will have consequences for your company when people begin to associate your game and company as “poor” when it comes to their platform of choice. All the more so when you’re talking about niche genres like fighters where the PC doesn’t have a lot of options at the moment. Once your company becomes associated with poor quality products, it’s going to take a lot to recover from that.
Putting your Best Foot Forward:
Deciding if you want to port your game to other platforms is a big deal and can lead to a catch 22 issue. If you don’t port your game, then fans will be annoyed that they can’t play it, but if you port it and it turns out poorly then they will be angry at you for releasing a broken port.
This is why just like with any part of creating a game, you need to make sure that you are putting out the best quality product that you can. If that means delaying one version of your game to get it right, then do it. Just like with any game release, you only get once chance to make a good impression or you’ll risk spending months attempting to build back that trust.
