GTA 3 Sales iOS vs Android - Why developers should ditch the Android platform

Individual experiences vary per developer and title. However, there is no denying that fragmentation is a huge issue on Android, and the way the Marketplace is set up (Google is not the seller, they are the payment processor) is leaving a lot more headaches to the developers than the way Apple has set up the App Store.

Here's a link to Mika Mobile's blog regarding Battleheart, and it's a good read. They seem to be more positive than we are, despite noting that revenue on Android is much less than on iOS and dealing with plenty of tech support issues.

http://mikamobile.blogspot.com/2011/06/android.html

It's also worth noting that marketing messages from any competitor of the iPhone App Store pick their biggest numbers and try to be as loud as possible about them as possible (just check any recent RIM, MS, Nokia or Google press release regarding their online stores). Those with a bit of sense would be wise to look a bit deeper into the numbers that are not being said before drawing conclusions about the real state of the mobile market.

The competitors tend to tout their:
- Total device volume
- Number of device activations per day
- Total number of apps on their marketplaces
- Number of registered developers
- Total number of downloads per day/week/quarter

And yes, surely those are big numbers to behold. Huge, earth-shaking numbers that burst with world domination. Exactly what's needed to inspire confidence in media, analysts and consumers.

However, for anyone interested in the data that's actually relevant for those who are trying to survive in mobile games as a content developer, look for these:

- Total annual revenue
- Annual average money spent on the app store/marketplace by a device user
- Number of device-specific ports to do in order to hit a sufficient user volume
- Random technical hurdles for porting (i.e. mandatory C# on Windows Phone 7)

Once you've compared those numbers together, the decisions of random publishers or developers to not support random platforms may start to make more sense.

Grossly simplified: if you see a huge press release from a platform holder that says in any shape or form "Here is a big number!" what you need to ask at that exact moment is "Why was that number not directly about money?"

The answer to the that question, usually, is simple: the money's not there.

 

Since you linked my blog post from early this year, I figured I should add some additional information, since many months have passed since I originally posted that. While we had a decent start on Android, sales quickly dropped off after their respective launch month, and for the year will represent about 5% of our revenue. YMMV.

 

This is pretty much in line with our experiences.

And even if there are improvements coming to the Android OS and Marketplace, a hefty chunk of the existing device base will never receive those fixes. Change will come slowly.