No Macs? Holy crap did WotC do the math wrong!

[Dannyalcatraz]

My dad stuck with Apple even during the years that I couldn't. (Plus, during that time, I decided Playstation was for games, computer wasn't--with some minor exceptions.) Yet he has never had a lack of Mac games. In fact, we just bought him another one for his birthday.

Once you separate the crap (however you define it) out of the vast majority of game software, you find that a lot of what remains is Mac compatible.

I understand that 100%!

It has been my experience that I can usually find the best of the best games available for my Mac, either as programs designed from the get-go to be cross-platform or in subseqent, ports to Mac OS, or even rewritten Mac OS native versions.

HOWEVER...

The trick is finding them at all!

I have a few buddies who are professional game programmers, so they often tell me when something is coming up for my machine. However, even when I know a game has been released, I often can't find it. Example from a few years ago: There was a great offroad racing game called 4x4 Evo. It was cross-platform for PCs/Macs/Playstations (which one, I don't recall). Even after I purchased it (having seen a great review in one of the magazines and actually talking to one of my buddies who worked on it), it was only available on about 33% of the websites I visited shopping for games for my Mac.

I once even found a site that listed cheat codes for Mac versions of games...most of which I never even saw for sale.

You can't buy that which you do not know exists.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

even the Nintendo Wii

Find a way to support the Wii remote properly and you have your first customer!

 

[Hussar]

I've made this point in previous discussions on mac market share in the past few weeks. It seems that until the corporate world adopts macs at a 50/50 ratio there will always be an excuse that macs are worthy of being left out. When looking at trends in the highly desired target demographic of college-aged laptop users, the affected groups ratio is even more dramatic.

But I also think that Charles Ryan's original post is being lost in the discussion on this thread. Even though macs have a small share of the total marketshare of all computers in the US, statistically it works out that 50% of groups will have be negatively affected by the decision to not target mac users.

Lastly, that so much of the meat of the DDI is being thrown into a client also ignores other important trends in the market and also bothers me. The more that is thrown into a client app means the trends towards web-browsing consumer handsets (highlighted by the iPhone and iPod touch) is an opportunity that is going to be missed.

There's a couple of problems with this.

First off, the only things that will be in the client apps are the chargen program and the Virtual tabletop. That's it. If you want access to all the other goodies, like your online library, Dungeon, Dragon, etc, you'll be able to without any problem on any computer. It's really only those two things. Not the meat of the DDI at all. Just a couple of potatoes and maybe a carrot.

The other problem is that Charles Ryan's initial idea is flawed. DDI is like OpenRPG or any of the other VTT programs out there. They are NOT for existing groups. Heck, WOTC has stated this repeatedly. If you are already in a stable tabletop group, then the VTT has nothing to do with you. It can be adopted for tabletop play, but, that's not its function.

What will happen will look something like this: A bunch of people sign up for the DDI. A smaller group will start posting ads looking for players in their online games. Those that have signed up for the DDI and have access to the VTT will join those games.

I know that VTT play is apparently seen akin to having relations with farm animals by a large segment of the EN World crowd, but, I'm here to tell you that there is a fairly large group of gamers who have no problem sitting down and playing D&D with people they've never met in real life. The fact that I can go on the OpenRPG boards, post and ad and get a group together in about a week shows that there is a fair bit of interest in something like this.

If you're a Mac user and want to do VTT gaming, there are all sorts of options available to you right now. DDI is just one of them. There's nothing stopping a Mac user from having a DDI account for content and then playing on Kloogwerks. So the DDI VTT isn't written for Macs? Big deal. Who cares? There's a dozen others that ARE written for Macs. Use one of them.

 

[JDJblatherings]

I didn't read the whole thread, so I'm not sure if it's already been pointed out, but Macs are pretty much completely irrelevant outside of the US.

Another great reason to support the MAC , it is made in america !!!

over a third of the Apples revenue is overseas sales, of course that could all be in mp3s and mp3 gadgets for all i know.

 

[Lord Rasputin]

This poll does not take into account how many people run more than one OS. How many Mac users also own a PC?

IME, not many. I've worked ISP tech support and been a personal computer consultant, so I've actually handled folks who have multiple setups, and they are decidedly in the minority. Most of the Mac users to whom I spoke (I was the Mac guy) were typically artist types -- we had others, but they rarely called support. The mom and pop calling was almost always Windows. And your college kids? They have one computer, period, and they don't have the money or the space for more. They're prime DDI fodder (almost all colleges have hard-wired Internet to dorms), and Macs are more common with them than in most other circles there due to Apple's historic presence in education circles.

There is another problem with the two box question, which is that it gentrifies the market. Folks who own both a Mac and a Wintel box have more money than those who do not. Granted, Mac folks do tend to make a bit more moolah than Windows folks (an argument in favor of Mac support), but in my experience, folks stick with one platform and keep moving their software from computer to computer. Having to buy new versions of your software because you traded your Mac for a Windows box is rarely high on the desire scale for most folks, so this inertia keeps out switchers and two computer owners. I know aiming at the money isn't a terrible idea from a business standpoint, but even D&D players aren't *that* rich (I'd bet they do have more disposable income than US averages), and a big percentage of them are not.

Personally, I don't have an issue about supporting Windows first, so long as it's Windows first and not only. With Boot Camp/Parallels running on Intel Macs, I can see waiting six months to a year for Mac support, but eventually, what Charles pointed out will happen, and that will limit DDI growth.

Having said that, I shall ruffle a few feathers and come across as a Mac bigot when I mention that I wouldn't worry at all about Linux support. For them, what Scott said is mostly true -- most Linux folks have Windows around, often on the same machine.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

First off, the only things that will be in the client apps are the chargen program and the Virtual tabletop. That's it. If you want access to all the other goodies, like your online library, Dungeon, Dragon, etc, you'll be able to without any problem on any computer. It's really only those two things. Not the meat of the DDI at all. Just a couple of potatoes and maybe a carrot.

I don't believe this is true. I read that those two things were the only features that required DirectX. There is still a client app to access many other DDI features.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

Another great reason to support the MAC , it is made in america !!!

that's a REALLY bad misspelling of china, dude

 

[Imaro]

If you're a Mac user and want to do VTT gaming, there are all sorts of options available to you right now. DDI is just one of them. There's nothing stopping a Mac user from having a DDI account for content and then playing on Kloogwerks. So the DDI VTT isn't written for Macs? Big deal. Who cares? There's a dozen others that ARE written for Macs. Use one of them.

Uhm...I'm a Mac user and this reasoning is all well and good, until we get to the point where I'm paying the same for a subscription as someone with a PC and recieving less. Plain and simple. Unless there's some way for me to reduce my subscription cost because I can't access certain features then I'm essentially paying for things in my subscription rate I can't use.

 

[JVisgaitis]

that's a REALLY bad misspelling of china, dude

LOL!

 

[Lalato]

I've said this on the WotC boards, but I'll add it here just to be the crossposting spammer that I like to think of myself as.

I'm a Mac user. I'm a D&D player. I have played in online games before, and am currently playing in one (Age of Worms via Skype and IRC). So in many ways I'm the target market. However, I can never use the apps that WotC releases for their digital initiative.

Not only that, but lets take my Age of Worms game that I'm currently playing via Skype and IRC. Most of the other players are Windows users. We would all be interested in the new DI tools, but sadly, if the DM decides that he wants to move in that direction, I'll have to drop from the game. If the DM and the other players decide to stay with the current setup because of me, Wizards will have lost a lot of potential customers.

You see... that's the problem here. Sure, there will be new groups that form around the DI and they will obviously form around Windows users because they won't have a choice. But there is also an audience out there of pre-made groups like mine that can't find a home on the D&D Game Table. That's a real shame because I think we all agree that the concept of the D&D Game Table is awesome... and not including users like me means that it does, in fact, affect more than just the Mac users. It affects Windows users too.

Now... here's the breakdown of value for D&D Insider (assuming $10 per month subscription)...

For DMs that use Windows, there is a great deal of value in DDI. You get Dragon and Dungeon magazine content and you get to play will all the new apps. At $10 per month, this is pretty good assuming that the apps and the content are all good.

For Players that use Windows, there is less of a great value in DDI. You get Dragon and Dungeon (which you don't use as a Player) and you get to play with the Character Creator and Character Sheet apps. So for $10 per month, it's debatable unless the Dragon content is stellar.

For DMs that use Macs/Linux, there is a decent value in DDI, You get Dragon and Dungeon magazine content which has a value of $6.50 per month ($39 per year from Paizo) and you might also gain access to some other content we don't know about yet to enhance your game. At $10 per month it could be good if all that content is worth your while.

For Players that use Macs/Linux, there is little value in DDI. You get Dragon content (you don't need Dungeon) and you don't get any use out of the apps. $10 per month for just Dragon is a bit steep. I can't imagine anyone paying for it.

So when I look at it like that, I have to say that for me, D&D Insider doesn't make sense financially. For others (DMs, especially) it will be a good deal depending on their platform. What I hope is that there will be a way to subscribe at a lower rate for just Dragon content or just Dungeon content or just the two magazines without any of the apps. This would get me to at least try it out when they switch it to a for-pay format (right now it's all free).

--sam