As Apple launches games on iPod/iTunes - how will this affect ‘mobile’ games i.e. games run on phones? If Apple goes WiFi in future, then it may well be able to achieve it’s dream of combining some mobile phone like features but without going through the telco network
Thanks to William Volk for pointing this article out to me
from pocket gamer
The fifth-generation iPods will be able to play a range of casual games, taking them head-on into competition with your mobile phone as a gaming device. Jobs announced that the games will be sold on the iTunes store for $4.99 each in the US – presumably around a fiver here in the UK, although less if we’re lucky.
The first tranche of iPod games for sale on iTunes are as follows:
Bejeweled — The super-popular colour matching game
Tetris — The original and still the best
PAC-MAN — Still scary after all these years
Vortex — A shoot-’em-up
Zuma — Like Bejewelled only this time you slide balls
Texas Hold ‘Em — Get into the poker craze
Mini Golf — Holy Apple, it’s a golf game
Mahjong — Centuries old tile-matching
Cubis 2 — Another colour matching game, this time with cubes
Anyone want to bet the development environment is 10x better than anything we see on phones?
Hey
I just finished watching the live event and this announcement got me excited. I don’t usually watch the Apple events. This “iPod games” and Xbox Live are chaning how we think about and play games. I wonder if anyone will be able to develope games in the future for the system and sell them on the Apple Store?
Duane
Sure, it’s probably easiest to develop for a single proprietary platform than for many different ones….
However, seems that no SDK exists yet…May be a closed garden?
This may be relevant: the mobile and handheld games website Pocket Gamer has started reviewing iPod games in their own section. Interestingly Zuma gets a higher score on iPod than mobile (control better for such a game?)
The new section is here:
http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/latest.asp?sec=6