Comment by badsectoracula
5 years ago
Look at Doom, Quake, etc for the benefits: fixing bugs, keeping the game playable in new drivers/systems/OSes, making better mods, etc.
The game content doesn't need to be libre, but the game engine benefits from it.
None of them adopted by Id or Bethesda, and representative of possible lost sales.
If it wasn't for Carmack it wouldn't ever have happened.
Instead of lost sales, one could easily argue on the side of increased market and mindshare.
I do not think it is guaranteed. But there are no guarantees. Even Nintendo has had misses.
Yeah, so?
The point of free software isn't just for the companies but also for the end users.
I am quite sure that users appreciate it, specially the monetary part.