Comments on: The New PC?

By: PoC

PoC — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 11:47:36 +0000

I know I say this every other time I post on my long archive trek, but this is really one of those topics that become absolutely fascinating in hindsight. I still don’t have an iPhone myself, being one of the most luddite-oriented ludologists I know, but virtually everyone I know who has a smart phone has one–and even the people whose brows crinkle with distaste when you mention videogames generally have a game or two they go to regularly. My roommate, for example, is now virtually incapable of watching TV without having an iPhone game running. My point is, besides the unfortunate fall-out of smart phone addiction, that it’s absolutely reached ubiquitous level, in my neck of the woods at least (which, to be fair, is a tech-oriented university, so perhaps not the best comparison). And while I’m still a little stuck up myself to accept that their games are just as good as anything else’s, most people don’t seem to have any problem not bothering with the distinction at all.

By: Al3xand3r

Al3xand3r — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 00:08:14 +0000

No, the PSP has no accelerometers to speak of so how could it? You use the L/R buttons to tilt the world. The Gameboy Advance did have such a game however, with the tilt sensors embedded into the cartridge. I forget its name but it was a platformer (duh). Some recent-ish Sony (or maybe not?) phones probably had similar functions and shitty games to use them.

Well I just remembered the Gameboy Advance game was Yoshi Topsy-Turvy. Not that it matters who did it first, this has great potential for every platform where such control methods can be available.

I think the lack of buttons make the iphone not suitable for regular games though. We’ll probably eventually get tired of the platformers, puzzlers and marble madness clones that we tilt our way through. Unless having the bottom part of the touch screen have an overlay of GUI buttons that actually work as normal buttons can work out decently enough.

By: Gap Gen

Gap Gen — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 12:47:02 +0000

Am I the only one that thinks controlling the game with the accelerometers is an idea with a lot of potential?

Doesn’t the PSP do this? With Loco Roco, etc?

By: Alarik

Alarik — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 10:46:18 +0000

Who cares about iPhone? This year is the year of Xperia X1… Really (I am so looking forward to it – hopefully it won’t disappoint).

Does RPS bother to cover Windows Mobile or other smartphone games? If not, I don’t see why you would bother to cover iPhone games.
Since Apple (and that means of course also iPhone) is based on the marketing (I guess this is their absolutely top priority), it is obvious that everyone has to know about iPhone (TV, internet, news, everywhere) – or rather it’s Apple’s way.

One probably doesn’t hear about Windows Mobile platform much I think (or at least I don’t remember seeing any ads except on specialized media or web pages), it just simply sells tons because it works (especially in corporate environments), has quite good support for Asian languages and because there is a wides choice of hardware and software available for it.

Writing about how WM or BlackBerry platforms are cool is similar to writing about how oxygen or breathing is cool – yes, it’s nice, but nobody cares (it is not exactly attractive topic and people who would use it probably already do)…

I think you can find nearly every kind of programs for WM (spreadsheets – yes, Excel can be handy sometimes on your mobile phone, games, media players, editors, web browsers,…) – just like on the Win platform. And if you are not satisfied, you are welcome to create your own application.

P.S. You can play Doom just fine on WM platform, especially on querty keyboard (but I miss the mouse)…

By: Ginger Yellow

Ginger Yellow — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 09:16:36 +0000

“Am I the only one that thinks controlling the game with the accelerometers is an idea with a lot of potential?”

No, but they still managed to balls it up on the Wii.

By: Dinger

Dinger — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 06:37:09 +0000

GPS can be interesting, but not on the tube. With enough bandwidth, you could make your own Aliens-style Space Marines C3 setup. Remote audio/video and pos on street/sat maps. I’m sure you could use it ffor some interesting urban variants of CTF.

By: orta

orta — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 01:23:32 +0000

I’ve played hours of text adventure games on my iphone, bliss

and I’ll throw a super monkey ball into the mix, that excites me too much

By: Doug F

Doug F — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 01:09:28 +0000

Only two mentions of Monkeyball so far? Am I the only one that thinks controlling the game with the accelerometers is an idea with a lot of potential?

By: np

np — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 22:09:23 +0000

As an iPhone owner I can testify that it truly has gone beyond being considered a simple mobile phone and does in-fact act more like a miniature tablet PC, so much so that you find yourself crying out for added features associated with PCs (like copy + paste, printing, writing word docs, scientific calculator and not least.. games), simply because you feel like they should be there.

As not being a avid handheld gaming fan, I would welcome any coverage and criticism you could offer on the device and it’s entry bid into emergent mobile gaming market.

By: Pod

Pod — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 21:49:38 +0000

Post about whatever the hell you want. Who gives a toss if it’s not strictly a PC? It’s your site, rememeber?

By: Biggles

Biggles — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 21:39:57 +0000

I’ve got to admit, I’m quite a fan of my iPhone. I read RPS on it every day and am really looking forward to seeing some proper games coming out. I get what you’re trying to say about the PC similarity too in that we’ll hopefully get a lot of the little quirky sorts of games that you guys often cover. I’m seriously considering getting some kind of mac (probably a mini) so that I can use the SDK even though I normally can’t stand the desktop OS. There are just so many good reasons to develop for it as an indie… 6 million might not make it the biggest target base but it’s certainly big enough if you make a killer app/game. There’s loads of control options too, like pointy clicky, dynamic buttons, gestures, multitouch, motion/orientation sensitivity, gps, microphone… As well as the onscreen keyboard. There’s loads of possible game types! Plus the ease of delivery and purchase. It’ll be interesting to see where things stand when android hits the market…

By: Sam

Sam — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 20:58:48 +0000

Robin: yes, but the question wasn’t “is the iPhone the next DS”, was it? ;) I’m fairly sure that it could compete handily in the space of portable gaming machines, but to be the Next PC, it needs more comfortable and involving interaction.