Nintendo Switch Is About To Get A Games Explosion
It's that time of year again, with the Game Developers Conference sharing its State of the Industry survey for 2018. This survey examines the games industry from many different angles, but this year, there was a fair amount of focus on the Switch. According to this survey, it seems a decent percentage of developers are looking at the Switch as a viable platform for their games.
GDC says that a total of 1 in 3 developers are interested in developing for the Switch. 36% of developers polled say that Switch is among the platforms that interest them most. That's a strong showing, as it places the Switch behind the PS4/PS4 Pro (which garnered 39%) and PC (which came in first place with 59%). Finishing just three percentage points behind an established platform like the PS4 is impressive, but it becomes an even bigger win for Nintendo when you realize that the Switch finished ahead of the Xbox One's 28%.
Of the developers polled, 12% of them said that they're currently making games for the Switch, while a further 15% said that their next games will be available on the platform. Those numbers are up from 3% and 5%, respectively, in last year's survey, which isn't very surprising considering the Switch was still a newly revealed console we didn't know much about at that point.
Perhaps the most interesting statistic GDC shared is that 76% of developers who have launched a game on the Switch say that it's selling as well or better than it has on other platforms. On the one hand, that's encouraging news as the Switch's smaller install base should theoretically lead to lower sales. On the other, this could just be a happy side effect of these developers getting their games on the console early, before others start releasing games en masse.
In any case, GDC's State of the Industry survey seems to paint a pretty picture for the Switch, and it'll be interesting to see what developers think of it next year. Of course, the Switch wasn't the only thing that was covered in the report, so be sure to head over to GDC's website to read the full thing.