First it was the total domination of the freemium model . Then the "internet required" model. These two developments have resulted in very few "big" games being released (where are the big holiday games from gameloft, EA e.t.c that we used to have ?) cause the big companies became lazy . For example EA has stuck with real racing 3 forever , not releasing a sequel because RR3 is enough with the freemium model, no need for a new sequel for customers to pay . Gameloft has stopped releasing new big games, their only big holiday game will be a freemium fighter, in the vein of warner's fighters that play exactly the same . Remember when we used to anticipate gameloft' holiday line up ? The devices are getting more powerful , the new games that take advantage of them are becoming fewer . Then it is the iOS updates that keep braking tons of games, some very essential ones . I don't know if it is apple's or the game companies' fault but we are at a point where buying games is not reliable anymore . Great classics like dead space and mass effect are gone but so are newer games like bioshock that some people paid good money for . We come at the final insult , the Game Center problem . Breaking the Game Center after an iOS update is inexcusable and has happened to a lot of people , one look at these forum and on the Internet in general speaks volumes . So we are at a point where we are stuck with the freemium models, a lot of paid games suddenly stop working and with the GC problem even the freemium games stop working . I wonder what's next....
I fear for the future of ios gaming. The game breaking updates are probably the worst problem. Only games that generate constant flow of cash give the incentive to put effort into frequent updates required. If I am a small dev and put a premium game on iOS store why would I have to constant update my game when I could be spending resources on my next project? It is not economic sustainable. Apple should adress this, but they probably won't.
Have to agree. When I first started playing on iOS it seemed like there was an endless stream of great games. Ever year that has gone by has brought less and less of these great games. I used to spend close to $100 a month easily buying new games. Now I haven't bought a new game in months. All the games now are being made for a casual crowd and to me those games are just boring. All of these clicker "games" are just ridiculous. I mean who thought that just tapping repeatedly on your screen would actually be a game. I don't get the masses. SMH
I feel the same All the things you say makes iOS a horrible system for gaming and I've been spending less and less time with it every passing year I'll build myself a decent gaming tower this summer and just game there because iOS doesn't have what I want anymore.
I can say that I don't purchase much anymore, but that's due to but having the time to play them anymore because I'm busy with my console games.
Exactly what I feel.. The lack of premium games and freemium constant internet domination is the downfall of mobile gaming.. That's why i jumped to android because the situation are just the same, but they got the emulators without jb... I still remember the times when every week will have a couple of great games and I'll buy new game each week.. The only game i bought since Chaos Rings 3 is Aralon 2...
The weird thing is that the success of the 10$ Implosion shows that there is a market for paid "big" hardcore iOS games. Then we get something like dead effect 2 that abandons everything that made the first such a joy just to force you to pay for iaps . Now it's not that I don't get enough gaming, I have a big selection of unopened ps4&xbox one games, yet I find the , now few, decent iOS games more relaxing . It's a pity to have such powerful devices and not decent games to support them. I wish psvita had been successful . What made me furious is the GC debacle, I mean come on Apple !!!!
I love mobile gaming. Lying on bed and playing is just perfect for me. So much better than sitting in front of TV in my opinion. Also, I have tons of games on my backlog. It would probably take a lifetime to finish them all. However, constant game breaking updates and games being pulled even from purchase history make me very insecure, so I am hesitant to spend a single cent anymore, unless I am playing the game right away. On other hand, we have only a few examples of F2P done right, like Marvel Future Fight in the middle of cashgrabbers slot machines. That's a shame. So much potential wasted.
Same thoughts here as well. Problem is, we may have been looking at things differently. Instead of lack of premiums and freemium domination being the downfall, what if we look at it in a way that that is how mobile gaming is defined, and how it has evolved, and that it evolved "too slow" that we only really see it for how it was, and its early stages were all we were seeing as avid gamers until now. Now that mobile gaming was given the time it needed to evolve, we now see that it isnt for us, that we arent the main market for mobile gaming. Maybe we were trying too hard to be its market when we now see that we arent. I mean we actually saw this years ago with the success of whale-infested freemiums, yet we chose to ignore those signs. Maybe, it was our fault for not seeing this earlier, and now face a choice whether to put up with it, or to walk away and dismiss it as a platform.
I think the issue is form factor. IMO,gaming in general is a different experience on a phone sized device. Now Apple has introduced gaming to Apple TV, and also an iPad Pro which seems lovely, but perhaps not ideal for touchscreen gaming. I suspect that devs see the market for "near AAA" games on mobile is so diluted that they might as well just stick with the more successful form factor (by many orders of magnitude), and shun projects that need a large screen. Also, I notice that prominent reviewers and others are now saying that if a game needs an mfi controller, it isn't any good. That doesn't help either, IMO (nor that Apple TV fails to support mfi).
I wouldn't say gaming on iOS is getting worse, per se: I'd say that there are fewer and fewer games worth playing. Tech-wise, mobile gaming has gotten to a place ripe with potential. Unfortunately, it's a potential that few developers are willing to take advantage of, preferring instead to release standard fare COC clones, vanilla card battlers or auto-runners, whose only selling points are the popular IPs they base them off of. And even though "Implosion" is a thing, and is an unlikely success story in a freemium-filled field (try saying that three times!), one game isn't enough to save an entire platform. Would that it had sparked a return of Premium gaming on the platform. Unfortunately, it didn't... Where does that leave us (or me, at least)? With a platform that gets tens of new releases every week, among which there seldom is a game that catches my eye or that shows promise of a long lifespan on my device. And I realize this statement is extremely dependant on one's particular tastes, but speaking only for myself, it's been months since I last purchased/downloaded a new game. Which is why my hopes are riding on this week having some major name releases. Otherwise, I can honestly say the third quarter of 2015 will have been a bust for me. This is why, personally speaking, it's so frustrating to read the standard "mobile is the future and will kill console gaming!", "Random Platformer/Quirky Game of the Week is GOAT! Now watch me never mention it again after two weeks have passed" fare that goes on daily on this site. Maybe other people are happy with what iOS has been getting (and more power to them!), but personally, the big releases/ports that got me into iOS are getting rarer and rarer, and if that causes me to drop the platform, then it might be an issue for someone else too. EDIT: Since this post seems to have generated some misunderstanding, I simply wish to clarify that all that is written above is nothing but my personal opinion on this matter, not an all-encompassing "everyone must feel like I do!" statement. Obviously there are still games out there worth playing (given the amount of games that are released on a weekly basis, law of averages alone dictates that that must be the case). They just aren't the sort of games I'm interested in, or that I got into iOS gaming for. Having said that, there's something to be said about being able to accept different opinions, and there seems to be an unhealthy tendency in this website to automatically dismiss any opinion that's not 100% positive about the platform...
@EP maybe i'm a little too spoiled on premium games.. i picked up the iphone when infinty blade and eternal legacy is released.. and a week after that, dungeon defenders is released! Really miss those days..
I disagree. There are still great games coming out. Sure the are some crappy games with badly implemented IAPs, but at the same time there's no shortage of great premium games and great games that do freemium well. If I ever reach a point when I haven't got dozens of games sitting in my "untried" folder which I can't reach because I'm addicted to other games at the moment then maybe I'll start agreeing.
I don't disagree. Even with more limited hardware, the ambition of some of the games coming out back in 2011-2012 was pretty staggering. Now it seems that a lot of that creative energy is confined to ports like those Amazon Studio games that came out this year. I'm sure even those will start to dry up before too long. That said, IOS still has such an immense back-catalogue that, even if it stopped releasing all new games whatsoever, I could still live off of my purchase history for years.
This is a God-tier post. Seriously. Couldn't agree more. Oh, and I picked up a New 3DS XL yesterday and have honestly had more fun in the last 24 hours than I have 6 years playing iOS games. Take that for what it's worth.
I can relate. I just got a Vita two weeks ago and even though it's a supposedly "dead" console I am absolutely in love. The amount of previously released AAA titles and KILLER indie titles have me sold. It's what I thought iOS gaming would be when I got my iPad Air. And there is really no reason many of those games, especially indie games could not work on iOS. The Binding of Isaac and Nuclear Throne for instance would be an easy fit. But then they would have to either be freemium or be sold for a meager $5 or the majority of iOS users would complain or not buy. That is a major issue that I think devs have to wrestle with. Do we basically give away a game on iOS that we charge $15-$20 for on Steam, PSN or Nintendo?
Owned both a 3DS and a Vita. Sold both of them. I can honestly say that I've had way more satisfying gaming experiences on iOS. Then again, I may be an outlier: I found Uncharted: Golden Abyss to be one of the worst game I've spent money on, and as far as I'm concerned RE: Revelations was almost as bad. The fact is, the whole idea of "AAA" experiences on handheld is painfully misguided, IMO. But the OP's assertion is that iOS gaming is getting worse. I think that's highly debatable. If anything, I would say that the platform has found its identity over the the last year and stopped pretending, Gameloft-style, to be something it's not. Dust: an Elysian Tale is probably my favorite gaming experience of 2015. Bought the game in Steam a while back and never played it. On iOS, I've put over a dozen hours into it. Take that for what it's worth.
Don't get me wrong, I love Dust! If there is a good quality game on iOS I buy it! I can only speak for the games I've played on Vita so far. It came with Borderlands 2 and although I haven't played the console version I played the heck out of the original on my PS3 and I freaking LOVE the Vita version of 2. Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter X Tekken and Dragon's Crown are awesome as well. I no long have a console or PC and to me (at least so far) the Vita is way closer to a portable console experience than my iPad Air. So I can't agree that great AAA experiences can't be found on mobile. But that's just me. Maybe it also depends on the type of games you like. I will be getting Uncharted, Resistance, Killzone and so many more games on Vita as soon as I can. I'm waiting on Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 to arrive in my mailbox this week. I just don't see those games hitting my iPad. I was so looking forward to getting the iOS version of MvC only to find out it had been pulled. Not to mention so many games being broken by updates and seldom if ever getting fixed. I'm gladly paying $15 for Binding of Isaac (which lived up to all the hype I had heard), Rogue Legacy, Hotline Miami and oh wow the list just goes on and on! I've bought a large amount of iOS games but I just see the ones I buy getting fewer and farther in between. I have NO problem paying for a great game but freemium is really hurting mobile and so are users too stingy to pay for a quality game.
for small games, iDevice is not a bad option. However, the quality of game drops sharply as the new developers come in. Luckily, there are iPhone transfer apps that can help you transfer data between different mobile devices.
I agree. This probably has to do with the fact that game development has opened up to the masses. If you go back just a few years this was not the case. Or at least it requiered some effort. It's much easier to publish a game today.
