It’s no surprise that the video game business has grown dramatically. The amount of video games sold throughout the world is steadily rising. The market is expected to be valued at more than 90 billion US dollars in 2020, up from 78.61 billion in 2017.
Games are now played on various platforms, from PCs and consoles to tablets and mobile devices. With the prevalence and accessibility of gaming nowadays, porting has never been more crucial.
What is Porting?
For those unfamiliar, porting is taking a game from its native platform and making it available on another. In any interaction, game porting encompasses many platforms, which means you may convert video games from Android to iOS, Mac, Windows, internet, or on PC and vice versa.
Porting is vital because, for instance, PC gamers cannot play games released only for consoles. Therefore, if you have created a game for PC and want to publish it on other platforms, you should change some technical specifications to make it compliant. In fact, the core game porting process involves many steps, which are the same in most cases.
There are two main types of ports:
- Porting games to different platforms. You can port your games to other platforms. For example, a game could be ported from Android to iOS, Mac, or Windows, and a browser game could be ported to PC and back. You can also port games from PC to consoles.
- Porting development technologies. This porting enables you to port your games to another engine using the SDK. For instance, you could port a game from HTML5 to Unity or any game engine.
Some ported games run worse than the originals due to poor optimization, while others are considered better due to various factors, such as new improvements.
Let’s learn more about the benefits of porting video games and the steps in the game porting process.
Why should I port my game?
- Cost-effectiveness. If you already have a great game, you can expand it to reach a larger audience. Many companies provide video game porting services. It is more operationally efficient and cost-effective to port a game to a new platform than to create an entirely new one.
- Wider audience reach. Porting means your game will be available on different gaming devices and reach more players worldwide, meaning you’ll earn more money from the sales of your video games’ downloads and reviews.
- Increased average session length. Porting games can stimulate users to keep playing, increase session length and improve other user engagement metrics. You can determine whether your gaming goals are met based on session length data for a game.
- Focus on upcoming games. Sometimes it’s more convenient to outsource your project to a game porting company than to handle porting in-house. Many outsourcing companies offer high-quality services with the best experts on the same team and can quickly create cross-platform gaming experiences.
- Revenue increase. Because multi-platform games achieve more downloads and are becoming more widespread, porting your game will cause your income to increase. However, it is essential to note that the more people play your games, the more time and effort you will need to dedicate to improving them.
A video game will appear substantially better on a PC than on a console or any other device in the medium-higher decks. PC games typically have a significantly better resolution, owing to the much greater resources available to PCs. Many people prefer playing games on PCs instead of consoles.
Games designed for a console are frequently transferred to PCs in this era. Just because a game is converted does not guarantee a seamless gaming experience. 4CROWS DIGITAL advocates outsourcing this endeavor for a trouble-free experience that will benefit you in the long term. The company’s website explains the significance and rewards of game porting.
The process of porting is another activity that is frequently overlooked. It’s a time-consuming and challenging process. The ordinary user will not notice the time and effort that ported PC games to mobile or vice versa. That’s where a company like 4CROWS DIGITAL comes in to take on the invisible task and finish it. At the same time, the developer can focus on other things.
