Comments on: Touching on iPhone Gaming

By: DJKuulA

DJKuulA — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:04:15 +0000

I tried Derek Jeter Baseball on my enV Touch. It’s supposed to be the best phone baseball game. It is inferior to All-Star Baseball 2003 on my Game Boy Advance in every conceivable way (except perhaps screen resolution, but it’s not as though the graphics are so wonderful anyway). Interestingly, ASB 2003 also features Derek Jeter as its cover boy.

By: selfawaregames

selfawaregames — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 05:45:08 +0000

Hey! Thanks for the nice mention of Word Ace!

I think one of the things that jumped out at me from the article was the distinction between “gambling games” and “games.”

To me, the biggest hurdle to making something that works or doesn’t work on the iPhone is whether the design of the game, literally from the ground up, was designed with the platform in mind.

For us, the biggest concerns were a control scheme that made sense for the platform, something that took advantage of the platform’s persistent connectivity, and something that people really expressed an interest in playing, but also something new.

So, in terms of “what works on the iPhone,” in my view, it’s not “games” or “gambling games,” it’s whether the game was built *for* the platform or not. Madden, for better or worse, is a console game on a platform with no buttons. Word Ace was built from the ground up for the iPhone and Pre.

Good post! Thanks!
seppo
(lead designer at Self Aware Games)

By: Ben

Ben — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 04:46:11 +0000

I’ll just wait for the second gen Palm Pre. Maybe that will have good games….