For the last few months, digital developer George and the Goat has been working on a full-AI digital version of Tapestry (Facebook group). They’ve made great progress so far–you can already see a preview of the working build on this video from The Mill–and they’re trying to use data and feedback to make the best version possible. We might even experiment and try a few things we haven’t seen in other digital game ports.
As part of this effort, Timm at George and the Goat created a survey that we shared among those who are interested in digital ports of Stonemaier games (digital newsletters signup). Today I’m going to share a few of the more interesting results with you.
I thought this was interesting because it indicates the type of people who are interested in digital ports of tabletop games are those who are deep into the gaming hobby (and are likely to be collectors).
I was really curious about this, because the vast majority of my experience playing digital ports until this year has been against the AI (essentially solo). Due to the pandemic, though, a lot of my gaming time this year has been spent on Board Game Arena playing against friends.
There are a number of beautiful full-AI games I’d also like to play against friends on game nights, but they require everyone to own a copy of the game. If I really want the digital version of a game, though, I’ll typically buy it under the assumption that I’ll just end up playing against the AI (even if I’d like to play against friends too).
Even though Stonemaier Games is barely involved in the development of digital games, we’re frequently asked when our games will be released on various platforms (which know at the same time you do–when the developer releases them). I think it’s important to keep in mind that there is a certain priority to releasing digital games, and it’s based on the audience size for each platform. As you can see here, Steam edges out iOS, followed by Android.
We try to make digital ports of our games available in the same languages as the printed versions, but similar to the platforms, English is prioritized for launch, and other languages can be added later.
Is there anything you’d like to share about your digital board gaming preferences? What’s a feature missing from most/all digital board game ports that you’d like to see?
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Also read: The Truth About Digital Board Games
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18 Comments on “5 Surprises and Insights from a Digital Board Game Survey”
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I am more likely to purchase a digital port of a board game of it comes with a free extra copy to gift to a friend (Steam).
For a single copy, $5-$7 is my spending limit.
And part 2 of the survey analysis is up, focusing on: localisation, accessibility options, configuration options and pricing:
https://www.george-and-the-goat.com/2021/02/14/dev-update-5-survey-results-part-2/
Again, thanks to everyone who took part!
Thanks Timm!
Another in-depth look at the data can be found here:
https://www.george-and-the-goat.com/2021/02/03/dev-update-4-survey-results-part-1/
I, like your surveyed group, like to play digital games solo. But I love variants that add to the solo experience like Agricola’s Solo Series. Thanks for this survey!
Is Tapestry still planned to be coming to BoardGameArena? Thanks!
It is! BGA is working on it. :)
All these polls are obvious to me. I fall in the majority category on all but one. I prefer to play on my iPad and I’ve failed to see why there is a push to put games on the Switch. The poll shows that the Switch comes in behind android but yet games come to Switch prior to iOS or Android. Wingspan is a disappointing example of that.
It was interesting to me too (interesting, but not disappointing) that developer Monster Couch chose Switch to prioritize over iOS and Android, but I trust their reasons, and I know they’re working on iOS and Android.
Having a bigger audience doesn’t mean that audience would buy a specific game. And there’s a lot more competition on digital board games on iOS/Android.
Plus, Nintendo selects some games to promote on their marketing games. That’s free publicity that can give you a lot of visibility. That’s how I find out about Wingspan was coming to Switch.
I understand that it’s disappointing when a game you like is not on your platform of choices, but I can definitely understand that bring a game to Switch is less risky than to other platforms with a bigger audience.
Thx for the insights Jamey. Interesting to see that the people who own so many board games are also the ones playing the digital ones. I would have imagined a bit of another target audience.
“Steam edges out iOS, followed by Android.”
As a tech geek I’ll note that iOS normally means iPhone+iPad which combined edge out Steam and from a software development point of view those two are the same apart from UI design (which is definitely not neglible).
Technically, iPads aren’t running iOS, though, because since with the release of iOS 13 in 2019 iPads no longer run iOS, but a derivative thereof called iPadOS which supports most iOS apps. That doesn’t make an actual difference here, but as mentioned I’m a tech geek :-)
With the release of MacOS 11 a couple of months ago Macs with Apple’s own CPU’s got the ability to run iOS apps and Macs make up something like 10% of the PC market. This ability is still somewhat unstable and not widely used, so it doesn’t change anything right now, but might in the future, thus increasing the importance of iOS and probably iPadOS.
How interesting the data, thanks for sharing this information
There are very few good AIs out there for games. Race for the Galaxy is one of them, but that had been worked on for a long time before Race ever hit my iPad. Good AI is just hard for some games
So, I collect the digital ports of Stonemaier Games just as I collect the physical copies. My favorites have been Charterstone and Wingspan. I think the Viticulture port is good as well, but I’m waiting for Tuscany to be added before I get really excited about it.
My digital game experiences are mostly for myself against the AI. The exception to this has been the early release of Gloomhaven on Steam. I grabbed my opportunity to play this with my familiar members in Wisconsin and Kentucky. Since it is early access there are a lot of little buggy things to look past… however the experience has been mostly positive. One of the things they do well is they give the ability to bring players in mid-game. This allows for easy reconnect when connections are lost or when someone wants to join a game already in progress. I’d like to see this in more games.
One problem that I have with the Gloomhaven port is the lack of undo opportunities for movement. I understand that you can’t undo attacks… there’s a random element there. But take-backs on movement would be optimal. I feel like the Stonemaier ports have all been very sensitive to someone’s need to be able to change their mind. Really well-done.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Lisa! I like the idea of being able to bring players in mid-game. And I agree, ample undo opportunities seem really important for digital implementations.
I was tinkering with TTS the other day when I noticed Wingspan was on the workshop! Do you program / create the TTS version yourself? Or did you hire someone to do it for you?
For us, Tabletopia and TTS create official versions of our games on their platforms (those are the only versions we allow).