KOSX

***Darksaviour69*** · November 30th, 2004, 03:49

about the hybrid idea:

u make 2 good points, but about the shareware, many shareware companies also offer a CD of the game also well as a download. some people like to have cd and case, to add to there collection.

i used to be a mac man, but support in N.ireland sucks, and the game market is so small, i remember games that were 2 years old were still full price Â£30, while the p.c. versions were Â£5, that sucked. the game market is so small that it would be easyer to get noticed on it than the P.C. market.

most dc hb games don't even use a 1/4 of the disk so putting 2 version on one disk would not be a problem size wise, and if you port goes to plan, making a mac version of a dc hb game would not much time.......but u would have to to double the testing

there are pros and cons, but increaseing you potential market is a good thing.... sorry i seem to be going around and around and around

**DanPotter** · November 30th, 2004, 10:29

[quote author=Darksaviour69 link=board=Dev;num=1101259752;start=15#20 date=11/30/04 at 04:49:20]u make 2 good points, but about the shareware, many shareware companies also offer a CD of the game also well as a download. some people like to have cd and case, to add to there collection.[/quote]

That's true...

i used to be a mac man, but support in N.ireland sucks, and the game market is so small, i remember games that were 2 years old were still full price Â£30, while the p.c. versions were Â£5, that sucked. the game market is so small that it would be easyer to get noticed on it than the P.C. market.

It's not so different over here. You really don't get a Mac to play games on it (one reason I got one: I have consoles at home and a pretty beefy PC at work if I need gaming

). That may change if they can get their act together and optimize the sw->hw path a bit more in the 3D world, as well as getting some reasonable documentation. But yeah, I went to look at e.g. Neverwinter Nights (some friends play that regularly) and it's still like $50 at the store. And how long as it been out?

The small market is nice though if you are trying to write games for it. People who happen to have them seem to be pretty happy to get what they can, especially more casual games that don't take 80 hours to complete.

most dc hb games don't even use a 1/4 of the disk so putting 2 version on one disk would not be a problem size wise, and if you port goes to plan, making a mac version of a dc hb game would not much time.......but u would have to to double the testing

Actually I think this is a lot more convincing reason to me than the two I gave. Completing and testing a game on a single platform is hell when you don't have a full QA department to work with (and purgatory even if you do) but trying to test two platforms at once would be even worse.

**c99koder** · November 30th, 2004, 12:20

[quote author=Dan Potter link=board=Dev;num=1101259752;start=15#21 date=11/30/04 at 11:29:11]The small market is nice though if you are trying to write games for it. People who happen to have them seem to be pretty happy to get what they can, especially more casual games that don't take 80 hours to complete.[/quote]

I can vouch for that. I've gotten over 300 downloads from Mac users, vs 150 or so for Windows, and around 70 for the Dreamcast. Noone left any feedback on versiontracker, so I don't know if they actually enjoy the game, but a lot of Mac users were at least willing to check it out

-Sam

**DanPotter** · November 30th, 2004, 13:45

Wow, interesting... so how did you get the word out about it to begin with? Versiontracker?

**c99koder** · November 30th, 2004, 22:08

Yep, just submitted it to versiontracker. I'm not sure of a similar free Windows site, so i wouldn't know where to begin promoting the Windows version. It's certainly not worth paying cnet for a download.com listing. Once I get everything sorted out for the next release, I'll try submitting to macupdate, too, and see what they think. It's so much easier to promote freeware for the Mac than Windows. I guess freeware is a foreign concept to Windows users.. it's either shareware or commercial

-Sam

**DanPotter** · December 1st, 2004, 02:21

[quote author=c99koder link=board=Dev;num=1101259752;start=15#24 date=11/30/04 at 23:08:40]Yep, just submitted it to versiontracker. Â*I'm not sure of a similar free Windows site, so i wouldn't know where to begin promoting the Windows version. Â*It's certainly not worth paying cnet for a download.com listing.[/quote]

You don't want that anyway. I've heard stories about people having their programs submitted to download.com "for" them, with spyware attached. I'm sure the spyware authors did it, but it's not a super reputable place to get stuff (to me) after I read that.

Once I get everything sorted out for the next release, I'll try submitting to macupdate, too, and see what they think. Â*It's so much easier to promote freeware for the Mac than Windows. Â*I guess freeware is a foreign concept to Windows users.. it's either shareware or commercial

I believe you misspelled "freeware or pirated"

But yeah... anyway, let me know how that works out for you

**c99koder** · December 31st, 2004, 11:04

Since 1.4 has been out for a bit, here's a quick followup about the differences between VersionTracker and MacUpdate and some other random stats:

VersionTracker downloads: 439, rating: 5 stars, feedback for the rating is a little 1-liner

MacUpdate downloads: 492, rating: 3.5 stars, feedback is a nice, in-depth review with suggestions for improvements.

MacUpdate also has a much nicer page layout for both their listings and their developers section, but only allows 1 screenshot instead of VersionTracker's 2.

I also submitted the linux version to freshmeat using the same description as the mac listing (omitting the macintosh sentence), and they edited it to be incorrect. They changed "Compete with players world-wide in the online high score ladder!" to "Internet play is included." which is not true, and some people expecting internet play will be quite disappointed

Statistics from access_log (this doesn't include a few windows sites that provide mirrors):
Mac: 1144 downloads
Linux: 127 downloads
Windows: 112 downloads
Dreamcast plain files: 44 downloads
CD Image: 43 downloads

-Sam

Edit: I was skimming the top referrers, and looks like someone submitted DCSquares to macgamefiles.com. Downloads: 67. It got 4 stars there, another 1-liner review. Pretty cool I guess

**DanPotter** · December 31st, 2004, 18:43

Thanks for the update.. interesting stuff. Any word on how the Windows versions are doing?

**c99koder** · January 1st, 2005, 22:00

I still haven't found any decent sites to promote the Windows version. I have listings on winsite.com and freewarefiles.com but the downloads are pretty small there. The high score table is still dominated by Windows, though, so the Windows users that are playing are much more likely to submit scores than other platforms. Though, it was nice to see the first non-beta-tester linux score posted a few days ago

Winsite.com (which mirrors the files so they can't be counted from access_log) downloads: 102. But that's both 1.3 and 1.4 combined. Noone's left any ratings or feedback at the Windows sites.

-Sam