That’s a good point. The number of Switches sold does nearly match Steam’s MAU.
Every Switch is handheld, but how many people are they capturing, or will they soon capture, that care very little about Nintendo games and just want to play games handheld?
Every Switch owner I know has bought at least one Nintendo game over its lifetime, and often several. According to the best selling Switch games list, it’s safe to assume at least one in every two Switch owner has bought Nintendo games for it. Is it due to the marketing and advertisement coming from the fact they own the platform, or that they’re still the kings of both casual and family friendly couch gaming? I suppose indie is strongly catching up, at least on the former but the latter might be more difficult.
I have a feeling that the “port everything to the Switch” crowd won’t really exist anymore in a world where that game already plays on a similarly-priced PC handheld without having to beg the developers first.
Wouldn’t that be nice? Given that PS and Xbox exclusives now all make their way onto PC to the point we barely have to ask anymore. Though if we were to reach that point, I’d seriously worry about the centralisation of the Steam market. Hopefully regulation will catch up soon.
I’m not hoping for regulation to catch up. I’m no lawyer, but I don’t think it counts as a monopoly when you reach your market saturation by just being better than your competitors without putting your thumb on the scale. If it did count as a monopoly, I’d hate to break up the best market actor as punishment for giving people what they want. I’m hoping for the competitors to actually compete. Right now, I’d say the only option out there other than Steam is GOG, and there’s a lot I’d like to see them improve too.
That’s a good point. The number of Switches sold does nearly match Steam’s MAU.
Every Switch owner I know has bought at least one Nintendo game over its lifetime, and often several. According to the best selling Switch games list, it’s safe to assume at least one in every two Switch owner has bought Nintendo games for it. Is it due to the marketing and advertisement coming from the fact they own the platform, or that they’re still the kings of both casual and family friendly couch gaming? I suppose indie is strongly catching up, at least on the former but the latter might be more difficult.
Wouldn’t that be nice? Given that PS and Xbox exclusives now all make their way onto PC to the point we barely have to ask anymore. Though if we were to reach that point, I’d seriously worry about the centralisation of the Steam market. Hopefully regulation will catch up soon.
I’m not hoping for regulation to catch up. I’m no lawyer, but I don’t think it counts as a monopoly when you reach your market saturation by just being better than your competitors without putting your thumb on the scale. If it did count as a monopoly, I’d hate to break up the best market actor as punishment for giving people what they want. I’m hoping for the competitors to actually compete. Right now, I’d say the only option out there other than Steam is GOG, and there’s a lot I’d like to see them improve too.