In the past, I've spoken to many developers about how their games sold on Linux and this time we have information on Slay the Spire to share.
First, we need to take into account that according to the Steam Hardware Survey that Linux only currently represents around 0.82% of the Steam market. Also, this is only on Steam and so it's not counting Humble Store where it's also sold.
Here's the breakdown the developer provided:
95.5% - Windows
4% - Mac
0.5% - Linux
To me, that's a surprise (the developer was surprised too) as that's quite low even for Linux sales. When doing this before (part 5) it did fluctuate quite a lot between 0.6% up to highs of around 16% (although that was a rare one with FLASHOUT 2 in Part 3).
Obviously a big part of the problem is just how many games there are now across all platforms. Even just on Linux, Steam has somewhere in the region of 5,426 games available and that's not taking into account all the bigger titles that can now be played thanks to Steam Play.
Competition is hotter than ever and being a smaller platform, it isn't obviously helping. It's basically the same story as it always has been—increasing our market share somehow is the only thing that will help. The uphill battle remains and will do for a long time, the important thing is to continue to make sure we're worth the time for the developers who do support Linux. Be helpful when issues arise, put up a review for a game you enjoy, tell those developers you enjoyed it on Linux and so on you get the idea.
Slay the Spire is a popular indie game, one with an "Overwhelmingly Positive" user rating from over 20,000 user reviews and it definitely deserves your attention. It's stolen a lot of time away from me personally, it's fantastic.
You can find Slay the Spire on Humble Store and Steam if you wish to pick up a copy.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: GuestAnd it won't increase the number of native Linux titles either - on the contrary, as has already been shown by titles revoking the native port in favor of proton.Others have already addressed most of your points, but I'd also like to point out that AFAIR the devs that removed Linux versions of their games on Steam were those where the ports were broken and/or inferior to Proton performance and they weren't willing to fix them. So even in those instances Proton improved the situation for Linux players, going from an unplayable native port to a playable non-native one.
Quoting: scaineWelcome to GOL! If you liked Dicey Dungeons, you'll absolutely love Slay the Spire. I can tell you that while I played all the characters in Dicey once (and once only) in about 5 or 6 hours (being generous, it was probably less), I'm still playing Slay the Spire after nearly 100 hours. (…)Thank you. I've been reading articles and comments for a long time, you I'm only new to you, but you aren't new to me.
I've definitely played Dicey Dungeons longer than you. I love Dicey's whimsical tone. It reminds me of Terry Pratchett's Discworld. Obviously there are still some rough edges, but it is still at version 0.15.1.
One thing that I don't like in Slay the Spire is the meta progression.
Quoting: scaine(…)So, I suppose that even at the more expensive price point, I'm getting way more than twice the value for Slay than I got from Dicey.(…)
I'm not questioning the price point in general. For me, Steam is a huge reduction in value, because even if you assume that the service will be available as long as you want to play the game, it still feels like a borrowed game. And I still resent Valve for the shift in game distribution from physical copies of games that you could install at will to empty boxes with a slip of paper. IMO that is highly undesirable and it made me stop buying (and playing) any newly released games for several years.
Releasing the source code (e.g. HyperRogue) increases the value of a game considerably.
As it is, Slay the Spire costs 21 € on Steam and that is almost thrice the amount I would be (reluctantly) willing to pay for a Steam copy.
On computers, games follow market share rather than the other way around, so the more people who use Linux altogether, the more games will become available for it. You should be aware that Linux market share has been steadily growing and has practically tripled on the desktop in the past ten to twelve years (from about 0.7% to about 2.1% according to Web hit based statistics). Of course, 2.1% is still a very small percentage of the desktop, but the growth curve could reveal a lot of potential. It's hard to know when that kind of growth curve will play itself out, but if it were to keep going, it could mean a double digit percentage in an unexpectedly short time.
stretch611 Feb 5, 2019
(I just looked and verified... on the "Caffeine" bundle they are only showing total sales and average of all sold.)
I remember when they used to have this information, Linux and Mac sales were always a bit higher than their actual market share. (Windows still sold the most by a wide margin.) But interestingly, Windows users used to pay the least, Mac was in the middle and linux users paid the most per sale on average.
Admittedly, Humble has grown quite a bit from 10 years ago when it only had a few bundles a year and no store. It is a bit more mainstream now and with a larger audience. Based on that I would suspect being more mainstream means a greater percentage of windows users now versus 10 years ago, but I really would be curious about the numbers. (Of course, the old humble was all cross-platform and DRM Free (mostly indie devs); and now it is possible to get windows only, Denuvo infested games in their humble monthly bundle.)
dirkdierickx Feb 5, 2019
i'll buy & play it for sure one day, there is no rush.
I bet there are a lot others like me in the linux gaming community.
Now that I think of it, I should probably start to be more attached to Valve instead of Humble, as humble really doesn't care about Linux as much any more, while Valve are the main force behind a lot of improvements.
Regarding Slay the Spire - I couldn't really find this game appealing to me. Maybe it's well polished and fun, but the idea itself did never interest me enough. Maybe the word rouge-like is holding me back.
Last edited by const on 5 February 2019 at 10:31 am UTC
please_use_plain_text Feb 5, 2019
Quoting: cbonesQuoting: please_use_plain_textQuoteAlso, this is only on Steam and so it's not counting Humble Store where it's also sold.That makes me wonder how a Steam key activation is counted
Unfortunately, they are not. I asked a developer friend (just yesterday I finally got an answer) and Steamworks shows very little information about keys. Apparently, just total activation and geographic spread of those activations.
:/
Grrr, maybe half of my games on Steam are Steam keys (mostly from Humble).
It surprises me that devs don't have some kind of overall sales stats by OS, including keys activations.
(And actually I'd be very curious to know what kind of stats devs have access to)
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