Flash, Facebook lead social developer tech survey

Game Developer magazine (Gamasutra's sister publication) has published the results of its first-ever social and mobile developer technology survey in the May 2012 issue. (The May 2012 issue is now available via subscription and digital purchase). Flash was the most popular development tool, with 59.2% of social game developers using it--though only 6.1% of developers reported using Flash's Stage3D features for 3D graphics. Interestingly enough, 51% of social game developers also reported using Unity, so even though we haven't seen many social games built in Unity released so far, it appears as though we're about to see that change. Facebook was the most popular social games platform, with 83.5% of surveyed developers publishing Facebook games, followed by 47% developing for a dedicated website, and only 16.8% developing for Google+. Of the games intended for a dedicated website, 66.7% are also targeting Facebook. 19% of Facebook developers are also developing Google+ versions of their games, while 100% of Google+ developers are also developing Facebook versions. The full social/mobile tech survey offers more detail about server technology and cloud hosting services, desired middleware, analytics, and more. The May 2012 issue of Game Developer also features a postmortem for Zynga's Indiana Jones Adventure World, a deep dive into TERA's free-targeting combat system, and more. You can purchase individual Game Developer issues or a subscription from the Game Developer web store, or download the Game Developer iOS app.