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Sure, there are some developers just take existing code and make some mini games, and it's just their choice to make bad games. There are some developer just port their games from other platform, which is still understandable. (like DinerDash, etc..) However, not all games suck!
Many title like racing games, puzzle, and fishing games are way better than DS version! Stop using your narrative point of view to judge something you don't like.
I have played dozens of the "high rated" iphone games and the only one that has been able to catch my attention for more than 5 minutes was tetris. It was still the worst version of tetris I have ever played because the touch screen is just bad for games, but I guess its all right while im waiting in line at the supermarket.
@beFair, I have to say the iPhone has pumped out some impressive looking games but nothing super addictive. I find the main culprit to be the much-heralded tilt controls. While it's nice and gimmicky, I don't want to have to wave my portable gaming console around all the time just to turn in a racing game. And it gets annoying if you're trying to play on public transit or in a car because you constantly have to adjust to the outside motions.
Don't believe it? try it for yourself. Don't like soccer?try enigmo, Hold'em, or even the outstanding FLUTE Ocarina ( play the flute on your phone by blowing in to the microphone and tap the holes to change the pitch...outstanding!!)
As for nintendo or the PSP...they beat the iphone with battery life...thats IT. games cost much more than on the iphone..so you can get a battery expansion pack for the money you safe.
and i haven't even started on the NON-game apps...its cool to have EVERYTHING you want in one device
The only people that that would say something like "I find the main culprit to be the much-heralded tilt controls." Is going to be someone who doesn't use an iphone/ipod touch because there are far more games for the device that do nothing with the accelerometer and they are fantastic. I also think that you are full of it for the fact that you are saying you don't want to have to wave your portable console around just to turn, well you're in luck because you do not have to wave it it around, you merely have to tilt it a small angle to either side or you can choose from the other multiple ways to steer that most of the racing titles offer. You're making it sound like you have to move a great deal. only the console must move not your entire body, so you only have to move your wrists a half inch or so. NO BIG DEAL! Why do you come on to a story about the iphones and make a comment pretending like you're trying to be objective and have no bias when it is obvious you have a biased opinion of the device and by the description of the gameplay you obviously have not had any experience with the device because it is completely backwards from the actual thing. Not to mention the fact that you mention racing games and the accelerometer because I would imagine that is what is talked about most often in news stories about the phone. There are far more categories of games than "racing" and a great deal take advantage of the accelerometer. I think racing games are quite fun on the ipods, being able to actually control the car with the console is great (I mean we all lean into a turn when we have the playstation/xbox controllers in our hands already why not make it actually do something.) My Xbox360 is awesome but the Wii is far more fun, I think that is the reason I like the Wii so much is that you kind of get the feeling you're really doing that thing. I think a lot of other people feel the same way considering the sales numbers of the Wii. We all know the xbox and PS3 are far superior machines than the Wii but it's just fun to play the Wii sometimes. And I think that is the reason people like and are liking the iphone more and more every day because of that same reason. (The difference with it though compared to the Wii is that it has superior computing power to its rivals in class and I would argue superior hardware too.) I would like to state here that I probably do have a bias towards the iphone/ipod touch as I am an owner and frequent user of both. I believe I can still have an objective view on the matter though. I do not own a DS or PSP but have used both on quite a few occasions. I own a Wi and Xbox360 too and like them each in their own ways (probably more xbox now though since I can stream netflix to my tv now!) I just do not appreciate people coming on to these sites and just bad mouthing various products because they have a bias against them. These reviews can be very useful to someone in the market for the product and it does them a real disservice to have to read that crap. If you have a negative opinion on a device based on merit I think you should absolutely express your opinion as it would be a great disservice to that same person to not be able to hear those views as well. So grow up and leave the comments section to people that have actually used the product and can be of use to the prospective buyer reading their reviews/opinions.
for fun, i downloaded books... and was surprised to see that they are very easy to read on the iPhone..everything works well on the iPhone...and, it also can be used as a phone.
My purchases from the iTunes store has increased dramatically, same with their app store.
I now cannot imagine not having it with me, even without signal I have something to do, write notes, update calendar, etc. Until the iPhone I hated all my cell phones and PDA's. Now with it and the fabulous Jawbone earpiece, I am a convert.
All the other devices bet their stake on being a superior gaming system, but that was all they had going. They failed there, so they failed all together. In the end, they couldn't survive by just being a gaming system. Nokia failed twice with the Ngage by combining a crappy handheld console with a crappy phone.
iPhone and iPod Touch on the other hand have already well established themselves as decent smart phones and media players that are already in peoples hands. They can work slowly on establishing themselves as gaming platforms since it's more of a bonus feature, rather than something mission critical.
Now it's the DS that has to sell itself to iPhone/Touch owners to convince them to buy a separate piece of hardware just for gaming.
Since the iPhone/Touch already earn their revenues as phones and media devices, they can stick around while developers figure out how to take full advantage of the hardware for games. Everyone has a mobile phone, not everyone needs a game console. People are more likely to play little games on the phone they already have.
It's a war of attrition in this case in which Apple significant edge.
Here's a completely different perspective, one that is overlooked here and good evidence as to why anyone commenting here would make a really bad CEO of any of the mentioned companies, and I want you to think about this for a minute, on why I don't think Nintendo is terrified of the iPhone/iPod Touch.
How many of you would give a 6-year-old, 7-year-old, 8-year-old and iPhone/iPod Touch for Christmas? Guys, there are millions and millions of little kids out there and they belong to Nintendo.
How many parents would buy their two kids iPod Touches each for Christmas ($229 each for the 8 gig) or two DS's ($99 each on sale). Plus the games, of course... which my kids will be sharing.
The article states that 85 million DSs have been sold. That's not 85 million technophiles. 10s of millions of those are little kids who casually use their DS.
Eventually one day these kids are going to turn into another demographic with a different reach. But they'll quickly be replaced by other kids (as young as 4-years-old). And it's those little kids that'll be keeping Nintendo in business for some time.
Perhaps Nintendo would panic if suddenly Apple made a very kid-friendly device with a very broad audience and cheap-cheap-cheap. But for now, Apple remains comparatively expensive and with a narrow (but lucrative) market.
I'm talking more about the 18-24-M-DI's and the casual market, where Apple can become extremely relevant. The hardcore market is pretty much saturated, so there's not to much to be done until the next hardware cycle. However even this group is likely to upgrade phones and devices in addition to their primary gaming device. If they have iPhones/Touches, it's one more places to sell games, and if they can compete on a quality level with what's on their DS, then Apple can start making inroads. It's a matter of Apple wooing the big names (Activision, Capcom, Konami), and time will see how serious they are in this area.
As for the casual market, though Nintendo has made the most progress, this area has only begun to be tapped and there is a ton of room for Apple to take it for itself. It's going to be a very close and heated race, and it's not just Nintendo and Apple, but EVERY mobile device out there vying for a piece.
So while I'm not saying iPhone will crush the DS any time soon, it is going to force Nintendo to prove its relevance to people who already have so many devices capable of playing simple games, and even some of the more hardcore gamers in the long run. It's still early, but I think it will be interesting.
Parents might also think twice about the "cheaper" nintendo when they realize that most iPod Touch games are less than $1o and most DS games are over $20. That adds up pretty quickly with a few games.
Also, wait 6 months to a year before you decide that the iPhone/Touch games can't compete with the PSP games. Remember this platform is less than 4 months old!
Finally, it all boils down to numbers. Apple will take a big chunk of the mobile gaming market simply because it will sell a boat load of iPhones/touches. Whether or not the games are "hardcore", immersive or whatever is irrelevant, Apple will take a big chunk of mobile gaming sales from here on out.
As a developer and user of the iPhone, I find those defending old tech an interesting approach to the path of futility. The future is damn scary, let's stick with the old things from our youth!! oops, where did everyone go!!
Those betting against Apple, really need to think things through. Every year, I hear the chants begin, and every year they are all sent running from the light.
It's not that Apple is perfect, far from it. However they do understand the mass user market, better than anyone else.
Google has some good ideas, but they have yet to understand how to get the mass market to wantonly drool over the offerings they have. In time I think they will do well.
MS hasn't been in the game for a very long time, and complacency and lack of initiative and creativity has really hurt them. You can't use the ld practice of following to end up number one in today's market place.
A lot of people and companies laughed at the iphone when it was announced. Funny how so many of them are killing themselves to emulate the success, of the device itself, the app store and overall drool factor.
Fun to watch though....
puhleez, why do you think the macs are a narrow (but lucrative) market?
The narrow (but lucrative) market is the people who are buying iPhones and iPod Touches compared to the people who are buying DSs like crazy for their children. Under 10-years-old. People like me, with my kids and nieces and nephews.
Yes-yes-yes, iPhone/Touch is making gigantic leaps and bounds, selling like crazy and they'll take over the world and we'll all be walking around staring at 3.25" screens, the technology is better and has so much promise... but first they'll have to convince the family in the minivan on the way to grandma's house to give the kids in the back Touches instead of the cheaper, simpler, easier to understand DS (we're talking Sally Homemaker here, not Joe the Programmer). Sally Homemaker makes the budget, she's not dropping $229 on an Touch, she'll give the $99 DS. Trust me. I'm married to Sally Homemaker. She's not going to do it any time soon.
And as long as there's that all important, critical aspect of economics involved, iPhone/Touch will remain a narrow (but lucrative) market.
Let me get this straight, the article talks about Nintendo "looking over its shoulder" while the iPhone/Touch sneaks up on it. It completely fails to take into account demographics and markets beyond technophiles.
I admire the iPhone for what it does. It plays games, make documents, surfs the web, texts, and yes, it even lets you make phone calls. This does not change the fact that it is a phone. As long as people, or the general public, think of it as a phone, it will not even have a chance. Even after people think of it as a portable gaming console, they won't use it any differently.
Meanwhile, Nintendo will be sitting in Tokyo, pondering just how many people don't have multiple DSs.
I've grown up in an age where phones do a lot more than dial numbers. We are used to convergent media platforms and not at all averse to it, so... the fact that there is almost nothing that an iPhone can't do, and do more cleverly than the rest, makes the device something that almost everyone lusts after.
A phone one day and gaming platform the next, who cares. Once upon a time people thought it was stupid that the DS has two screens and a stylus- because those things had nothing to do with perceptions of gaming at the time.
I easily play my iPhone games more than my DS titles, not just because they're more mature, or even superior (though some of them are). It's because they're convenient, they're packed in whenever I grab my phone, and when I sit in a lobby clandestinely playing Texas Hold'Em I don't look like an idiot tapping away at a big red plastic clamshell.
It's also huge, dying, and doesn't make phone calls.
I never play my PSP, and the games I do play would run just as well on an iPhone. Of all the people who ought to worry about the iPhone, it's PSP product managers who should be wringing their hands.
Clearly there are people who WOULD buy a game from the app store. I find it odd that you would base your opinion on what "a couple gaming industry execs" purchase habits are.
If i was a gaming industry exec, i wouldnt be such a cheapskate, and i would purchase a game just to see what the competition is like.
I have to say that as for game console i would prefer the psp, but it just doesn't go 'in my pocket'.
I used to play a lot on my psp, but ever since i got my iphone i just never started it up again. My iphone is my mobile, my organizer, my browser, my music, and yes, my games. That's why i prefer the iphone myself. I always got it with me because i always need it, when i want to play a game, i don't have to think: Oh, i forgot my psp again..
Anyway, as for gaming i do like the psp better, but i won't use it over my iphone.
In my opinion the DS is a fail, because the iphone games much nicer.
Sorry for my bad english tho,
- Later
Overall, I think that more people would play games on the iPhone than the other platforms, since there are not that many adults that would by a PSP instead of the latest phone. And since they are going to by the phone, the gaming capability is just an added bonus, and they will always have it to pass the time.
Ever since he bought me a gorgeous diamond necklace from www.idonowidont.com as a early Christmas present he has been hinting for some type of new video game console.
But if they are all ending up available on iPhone anyway i would just get him that instead!
It would also be good to see at least a basic level of quality control.
Also for year's people have claimed Apple product's are superior perhaps it is just the advertising. IF you like working on stuff/hacking/tweaking running your own programs not just the stuff Apple sells do not buy an Apple product very little 3rd party mod's and things you can do.
The more control options you want, the more buttons you'll have to festoon the touch screen with, which either means they'll have to be tiny buttons (which will lead to lots of frustrated people) or you'll have a tiny space for the actual game images. Imagine trying to put games like God of War: Chains of Olympus onto the iPhone. They did a good job with Star Wars: The Force Unleashed but the simplicity of the touch screen controls made it disgustingly simple to beat.
For anyone who scoffs at the battery life being the 'only' superior feature of the PSP or DS, that's a big issue for many of us. If I play anything demanding on my iPhone the battery is nearly dead before the end of my commute. That'd never last me long enough for a long bus or plane ride, a wait in a doctors office or the like.
There's also one factor people aren't considering here: brand loyalty. I've been a Nintendo customer all my life and although I don't like every game they put out, I've always found something from them that satisfied me. As an avid gamer nothing on the iPhone has held my interest for very long, but I'm still playing my PSP and DS every day on my way to and from work. The iPhone might conquer the world of cellphone gaming and even take some of the casual gamers away from the DS and PSP, but it's never going to be the dominant power unless it increases in size (allowing for a bigger touch screen) or adds buttons.
Remind me how a conventional D-pad or analog stick are hard to digest? And let's not even mention those four buttons loitering mischevously on the other side of the screen...
But on the plus side, I'm so glad "developers are exploiting these features"! But of course don't get me wrong, by 'features' we all know you mean just tilt and touch. Just tilt and touch. Hang on a sec, what gamechanging features were you talking about again?
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I was at a conference last week and met with a couple gaming industry execs. I knew Apple was planning a PR spin along these lines, so I asked my contacts about Apple's chances. Both agreed that Apple can be a viable mobile gaming competitor, but not a portable gaming one. One of the gentlemen said that he likes the iPhone as a gaming platform. "I have close to 20 games I've downloaded from the App Store," he said to me.
"Really? How much money in total have you spent on those games," I asked.
He grinned and said, "Not a dime, they were all free Apps. I'm not sure I'd pay for one."
There you go.
Keep being a naysayer.