Why iOS gaming is not taken seriously?

^this

 

I couldn't have said it better. I still like the convenience of my iPod but that's all really. The constant stream of easily affordable games is also fun, but in terms of "serious gaming" there are far better choices. That's just how it is.

 

I hate both the PSP and DS equally(it's a somewhat unfounded hate that stems from loving my GBA so much), but this is the truth. Most people here have no, or a very small, knowledge of iOS development--dedicated development either...most likely.

Plus, why would I want to have to buy a new iDevice every year ,or so, plus pay dedicated console prices. There's also the lack of physical button for intense games and no good peripheral currently. Battery time already suffers and would be much worse. Also, why would I want to pay high prices and deal with all the mess ups that iOS can cause games and deal with iOS updates completely breaking games.

 

All the appstore millionaires made their millions from the damn casual minigames. Console-quality devs just don't make nearly as much effort/cost-profit ratio. People are brainwashed to be content with barrages of 99-cent games that are simpler in concept than most flash games on miniclip, they don't want console-quality games. Everywhere you go in RL or on forums people talk about stuff like angry birds or tiny wings for iOS devices, games that probably took 10 minutes of brainstorming and another few hours to code, yet they make more money than all the other good titles combined. If you talk about some actually good games, like Ravenmark, people will go "wuh?", then go back to playing their pocket god. It's like if the population was fed hamburgers and fries everyday since day one, then they're perfectly content with stuck with fast food for the rest of their lives and they won't want something like escargot because they never had it before, despite the fact it's a million times fancier. If from day one people demanded console-quality games, and those stupid 99-cent apps aren't as popular, then we'll actually see games that make you play longer than 2 hours, ie most games for the PSP or DS.
Games like FF Tactics, Dead Space, Bard's Tale, PVZ, and maybe the kairosoft titles are the very few struggling console-quality titles stuck in the middle of millions of "fast food" apps aimed not to be serious "games" but to make quick cash.

 

Here's something else I wanted to add to the equation!

 

These are all very good points strengthening my decision to not upgrade my iPod to any newer model. I'll stick with what I got and get my gaming done on a dedicated handheld.

You're absolutely right, it doesn't make much sense to deal with yearly upgrades and new OSs that make my games unplayable. I actually kind of bragged recently that whatever happens to the iOS market at least I have a huge backlog of games to go back to. It turns out roughly half of those games are critically bugged until they're updated, which most will never be. At least they were all dirt cheap.

EDIT: let me also say that there are still a few games I'm keeping my eye on here, so I'm not completely against iOS gaming. It's just that a dedicated handheld is the far better choice for me, personally.

 

Yeah, I'm thinking the iPod 5 will be my last if things don't change for the better.

IDK what I'll get if this happens. I might go back to console, especially since the new systems are due out soon. Maybe check out what Google and Microsoft have planned for the future of mobile gaming. Maybe, I'll give the PSP another shout, but no DS for me.

 

Haha. No love for the DS? I actually thought the 3DS was pretty cool but I've never been a huge fan of first party Nintendo titles except Mario Kart but those days are long past.

The Vita is for sure a beast of a handheld, though. It wasn't a hard decision at all after tallying up the positives vs negatives in my case, but of course to make the most out of it it's best to own a PS3 that can be used as a secondary storage to weigh out the effect of those dreaded proprietary memory sticks. And don't even get me started on cross-play, dual joysticks and remote play. Such a long wait til the end of February.

Oh and btw, new consoles won't be out until at least 2013.

 

Yeah, I hated the DS. The PSP just didn't fill my GBA void at the time, so it might be different now.

I have to admit that the Vita does look mighty fine. If it would've went to only virtual content I would've easily passed, but I'm super happy they didn't go that route.

Well, 2013 is soon for me considering when they first came out--even '14.

 

Here's my 2 cents if anyone cares...

Granted there is no Uncharted or Mass effect for the iOS but there are a handful of great games.

There are two HUGE factors that get overlooked.

1. I think as a whole iOS gamers are a little spoiled by so many games to choose from. (myself included)
Ill explain. Don't hate on me yet because it's not the gamer's fault.
A lot of people just spend .99 cents. Fire up the game die once and say meh and move o when the game. When in fact, it may have may be a good game. The overwhelming majority of players don't even allow time for the learning curve.
I think the flood of crap over shadows the gems. I think there are easily 30 or more really awesome games on iOS.

2. Budget.
In order to compete without having a 30 year IP like sonic, you pretty much have to go in at .99 or you have a huge chance to fail as a developer and lose everything you invested. A large company can spend 500k on beta testing alone. Most of us can't spend that on the entire project.
At .99 you would have to be #1 paid game for like 3 months straight to just break even with 10% of a major studio budget.
Why do you think so many major studios are finding ways to milk $50 bucks from free games?
Just food for thought.

I think if the app store had a minimum of 9.99 or even 4.99 we would see the quality go up substantially.
But then again you risk losing seeing some indie gems. I mean without the app store we wouldn't have seen a spring of indie games breaking the mold. (for better or worse)

 

Agree with you on pretty much everything. I can only imagine how much your game cost to develop after researching iOS development.

As a non-dev/publisher, I can even find fault in console prices, but I've always understood why I paid what I paid. Gaming is a luxury experience that I'm buying. Could a game like MW2 have sold for 20 or so dollars cheaper, turned a ridiculous profit, and supported the makers, publishers, & new development? Yes, however luxury is a commodity. I also want to point out that I'm in the crowd of people that feel console games are meh nowadays.

However, with iOS not being dedicated among the other things I've listed, it's hard to fully jump on board with a significant increase. There are a ton of ways I think the market could be better and fair, and I've littered them all throughout the forum, but they'll prolly never be implemented--at least not any time soon.

In the world we've created, earth no longer spins round; it swerves and squiggles IMHO. The irony of it all is that we get sold these problems in games when you follow storylines.

There's 3 price points: cheap @ss, fair, and sucker. Fair is too communistic/socialistic (take your pick) though, and the consumer is to unaware to ever find the middle ground anyways. .

Anyways, I typically buy games on iOS every week, no matter the cost as long as I deem it worthy.

 

Honestly I think it comes down to people now just loving to complain and wanting everything cheap. Everyone thinks console games are to expensive and iphone games are too expensive. Nobody has respect for developers anymore, they talk as if are owed something.
Even a great cosole type game like Deadspace is put down by IOS users. They will look to find 1 thing missing and say oh thats why its not console worthy and should be 99 cents. I saw reviews on slide to play about Super Jump World( Leps jump world now) and they talk about how its missing features that the Nintendo WII mario has. How the hell can you compare a $50-60 dollar game to a 99 cent game and those people call themselves reviewers?? Thats how pathetic people have become as a culture. I read this post at a website that perfectly fits what Iam saying
http://ios-game-reviewer.forumotion.com/t2-iphone-games-are-slowly-going-up-developers-are-greedy-imho

These freaking morons are why the appstore is in the state it is today. Those are the idiots bringing us down.

 

Hahaha. I find it hard to believe its acceptable to even post that link. And be careful how you use the word "moron" kuz some kid will report you for it. But I agree with u 100% definitely.

 

And I Quote one of the most ridiculous post I ever seen
"" Hahaha lol thats true name one game that actually is worth more than 99 cents. All the games are simple mini -games and half of them sucka$$. I have to delete most of the games I buy becuase they are pure garbage.
Look $5 for a game is ridiculous and outragous. Thats alot of money that I can spend paying rent and feeding my godamn family and you developers want me to buy games with it. People dont understand the value of a hard days work , I brought the iphone for $400 so every game should be for bleeping free.
Indie developers have the nerve to charge more than 99 cents per game, the fuking nerve of them!! Who are you to price guoge and charge $2.99 for a freaking game. What give you the right to reach in my pocket and take my cash.
I buy 5 games on iphone and half my check is gone motherfuk it.""

I absolutely love your signature, its perfect!! Lets give this cheapskates hell!!

 

It's not taken seriously since 90% of people with an iPhone think there's nothing that could be better than Angry Birds and Doodle Jump on a PHONE. And then that's how people WITHOUT an iDevice see it as well.

 

In order to get the quality you want you must be ready and willing to shell out the money. There is a reason companies dont fully embrace the iphone market and its not going to change when games like dead space are 99 cents. Dont look at developers, look at yourself.

 

Is this post a joke?? Serious question.

I'm not a hater, but iOS handhelds have only 2 things over Sony and Nintendo. First thing is a HUGE list of affordable games. Second thing is convenience. That's all, IMHO.

Don't get me wrong, iOS offers some very decent console like experiences and at good value, but compared to the dedicated handhelds iOS offers very mediocre console style experiences at best, even compared to many psp games.

Yearly upgrades and updates that ruin many games isn't a very convenient aspect either, so dedicated handhelds are better in that aspect. Plus it seems like all graphically intense iOS games (ex. MC3, ShadowGun, IB) experience more than their fair share of crashing.

If I've learned anything over 2 years of gaming on my iPod (started with a 2nd gen), it's that the iOS market caters heavily toward cheap mini games rather than actual gaming. In my opinion at least..

 

Just a little bit of my thoughts

I just want to tell that the issue of pure games on different platforms is a common issue across all entertainment spheres. Can u see what is happening to the movies? The same thing. It’s all about the budgets. Every day the horsepower of our computers/consoles/phones is increased but it's truly getting worse for developer. One who saw some beautiful game or movie with the cutting edge technology would expect the same sort of quality next time. But who of them would like to spend more money? Who actually cares of the price for tickets or smth? Almost nobody and that is normal, markets were established. But what should developers do? Back in times when the hardware was pure it was all about the game design. But now, no matter what is one might say - it's become all about technology (strictly speaking). For the developer who doesn’t have large revenues from the previous games or don't have any huge investments there is no any other scheme but to make a simple but let's say cool games. Especially on the mobile platforms, where is almost everybody is a newest developer. But if we speak about the grand developers, like EA... They can make a great game and you know what? You can't say with certainty that this developer will have the profit. Sometimes yes, it will. But sometimes it may only be for the brand supporting, or just because of the underestimates. But those developer have money, they can do the trick and can pay for the risks.

Summary.
The games/movies become more and more complex, but prices for the consumers are almost the same. Development time is increased but gamers don’t want to wait their games for ages. All this reasons causes budgets to grow so much that there is almost no hope for the newest developer to enter to the market.

 

Its also a catch 22 for me, i'm still amazed at how cheap games are, probably because i'm an older gamer and i'm stunned at what great games we're getting for peanuts (and then such a shame when people wait for it to be free or a price drop, theyre the first to complain when theres not enough good games out - probably because devs werent making enough and move onto Android) but as they are so cheap i tend to buy a lot.

As someone pointed out above i admit i tend to load up say a 99c game, play it for about 30 mins and then try another new game i had bought. If the games were $15 each i would straight away play them much much more.

It reminds me of emulators, i love emulators but you tend to dip in and out of so many games instead of really concentrating on one game for so long. Same for iOS in my view, i've got so many games i tend to dip in and out and theres only a few games i really play for a long long time.

Its still a great scene but i keep hearing how much Android is taking up of the market which is worrying, thats why we have to support the devs so they continue making more great games.

But when games are 99c or so i'm stunned when people wait for a price drop or for the game to be free.