The interesting thing about PC versions is that Rovio may (possibly) make less money off of it due to the lack of in-app purchases. However, without the annoying distraction of the in app purchases (or worse, ads after every level), gameplay experience on the PC versions are drastically improved and more immersive in a way.
Could this focus on revenue hinder the proliferation of PC-only titles? Did ABGO’s PC port get canned from the get-go because of the lack of IAPs and complications with social network integration?
It’s quite an interesting discussion to me because if someone made a quality PC game I would have no issues with forking out upwards of $70 in local currency to play and keep it. And ditto for the expansion packs or paid DLCs in future. The key here is quality. And another big plus for PC games to me is the ability to go back to the game in future, install the latest and greatest community mods and keep the title alive for just about, forever. Like Fallout 3 / NV and Mount&Blade: Warband which are my favourites. More recently, there were the awesome X-Com remakes. Buy once, play forever. Epic unbeatable value.
In my opinion I would love to see Rovio have a small niche market for quality PC-only games (not just mobile game ports) with a higher degree of complexity and immersion.
Bad Piggies to me is half the “PC Game” equation perfected. All it needed was more ‘simulation’ tools and persistent world implementation in the sandbox for multi-vehicle ops and base building. Building incredible machines feels lame when there’s no big world to use them in (or mechagodzillas to battle against!), and worse, no way to save them in a ‘garage’ for future deployment sans the need to look at screenshots at reassemble them.
The concept of Bad Piggies, if taken further, could have resulted in some sort of 2D ground-based Kerbal Space Program, but alas, we would likely not see this idea come to fruition. The PC Simulation market is just not profitable enough, I guess!
