Android has been a big topic at the GDC Online conference this week, although different views were heard from PopCap and Appy Entertainment.
PopCap’s Giordano Bruno Contestabile was positive: “Android could be a 600 – 700 million subscriber market by the end of the 2012. You can’t ignore it,” he said. “ARPU on Android is currently about 20 percent of iOS, but that could be 50 percent by the end of 2012… My personal view is Android will remain an open market but it become a bit more restrictive, which will make it easier for us to sell games.”
However, Steven Sargent from Appy Entertainment gave a downbeat summary of his company’s experience porting to Android: “There are too many devices for a company of our size to deal with the compatibility on Android. Compatibility was a real nightmare… The piracy rate on Android was 70:1 compared to 3:1 on iOS. That’s crippling.”
