I have every console, a phone, a tablet, and a PC. I got Choice of the Deathless on Steam after being enthralled by it on my tablet browser. But now I see I can ONLY play it on my Desktop on steam. Is there some kind of cross verification or way to play my game on all my platforms, as obviously I’m not going to buy 6 copies of every game I want to play.
Not that I know of. I used to have an iPhone before switching to a Galaxy and when I bought a game I had previously on apple, it charged me. I guess they could introduce an email verification or a Choice of Games account which will give you access to all your games cross platform
Yes, but how would the other platform (Google/Apple) make any money in that case?
They don’t want you to switch platforms. The fact that you lose your digital library is a huge retention factor.
How Google and Apple make pretty much all their money… Advertisements.
There is an online shop called Humble Bundle which sells the latest Tin Man Game - Appointment with Fear. If you buy from there, you get a version for Android, PC and Mac. The PC version could be downloaded directly or a Steam key could be used.
However, this is the only cross-OS promo I know of and unfortunately, it doesn’t include iOs.
Apple primarily makes it’s money selling hardware.
If people want to release free versions of their game supported by ads they can, but it generally isn’t a great way to make a living. That’s a totally different issue.
iOs and Steam (and whatever else) are different platforms owned by different companies with different user accounts. They don’t offer (and have no financial reason to offer) a way to make purchases cross verified.
Love buying the tin man games through the humble store. Since I can sideload them on my kindle fire as well as play them on my surface.
I would really love for this to happen, if it’s at all possible, along with saves that sync across the platforms. I want, at least, a copy on my phone to use while I’m out, a copy on my tablet for when I’m laying in bed, and a copy on my computer for when I’m up and about at home, but I don’t want to buy a game 3 times and having it on multiple platforms doesn’t do me a whole lot of good if I have to start over on each platform. As it is, I get an e-mail on my phone about a new game that sounds interesting, I click the link to buy it and it takes me to the app store. I play it a little in my free time during the week, then on the weekend I spend all day staring at my (relatively) tiny phone.
I don’t have any experience with marketing and distribution, but many services sync saves/progress across platforms, so that doesn’t seem too hard (but maybe expensive for server space), and I think there are ways to give vouchers or something for free downloads of paid apps. If that’s true, that could be used to give versions for multiple platforms, even if you would have to buy from the website originally (possibly). You could probably even have two pricing tiers: a cheaper one that is locked to the purchase platform (but saves still sync if you buy it for another platform), and one that costs $1-2 more that will get you a copy on multiple platforms (ideally unlimited, but possibly something like “up to 5 selected platforms”)
I would like this myself. I purchased all three Hero Project games on Steam not realizing at the time that it was also available on Android which I would have purchased on instead. Especially in light of another Hero Project game coming out (though my understanding is new character and I don’t know how much of an impact if any previous saves will have).
As you said I would not mind bundles where chipping in a couple extra bucks gives it to me on multiple platforms or at least a way to transfer over my saves. Not sure if some carry over especially after I had to reset my phone.