Market Research

[Crater Creator]

First of all, apologies if this isn't the most appropriate forum for my question.

I'm part of a team of developers working on a science fiction MMORPG where players fly through the galaxy in spaceships with a top-down view. Over the months we've run into problems since we don't know what kind of target specs to shoot for. We'd like to know things like what operating systems people interested in such a game use, what kind of internet connections they have, and at which screen resolutions they play games. Since ours is an open source project, we're not in a position to pay someone to find these things out for us. So I'd like to know if there are some websites or other sources that would have this kind of research publicly available.

[Carlos Camacho]

There are a few books on the market that deal with various marketing issues of the gaming business. Also some VERY expensive reports. Gamasutra/Game Dev Magazine may have some articles on the topic as well.

As for your questions...

>We'd like to know things like what operating systems
>people interested in such a game use
You mean on the Mac or all platforms? If your game hasn't been completed yet, but is on the drawing board, it is safe to say by the time you ship Mac OS X users will be an even larger % of total Mac users. If you can make your game in Carbon, so OS 9 users can play, then do it I say. But my guess is that people running on OS 9 haven't switched due to the specs of their machine. Which in my mind, if their specs are not up to snuff (right word?) to use Mac OS X, then your game may be running on an old system (their system), so I wonder about performance. (This isn't to open a debate OS 9 speeds vs. Mac OS X speeds, etc)

>what kind of internet connections they have
I think if you search the net, you will find this data for the US, Canada, etc

>and at which screen resolutions they play games.
Tougher one to answer. Take a poll. BTW, some people like full-screen games, while others do not.

>Since ours is an open source project, we're not in a >position to pay someone to find these things out for us.

Sure. Look at some of the current games that are near to yours in design, and check out their requirements.

Cheers