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iPhone Shakes Up the Video Game Industry

Posted by Soulskill on from the shakes-down-customers dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "Troy Wolverton writes in the Mercury News that in less than a year, the iPhone has become a significant game platform, but its bigger impact could be to help change the way the game industry does business. 'It's got everything you need to be a game changer,' said Neil Young, co-founder and CEO of ngmoco, which develops games solely for the iPhone. With a year under its belt and an installed base of iPhone and iPod Touch owners at around forty million, the iPhone/iPod Touch platform has eclipsed next-gen console penetration numbers and started to catch up to the worldwide penetration of both Sony's (50 million) and Nintendo's (100 million) devices. Wolverton writes that not only is the iPhone one of the first widely successful gaming platforms in which games are completely digitally distributed, but on the iPhone, consumers can find more games updated more often, and at a cheaper cost per game than what they'd find on a typical dedicated game console. While an ordinary top-of-the-line game for Microsoft's Xbox 360 sells for about $60, and one for Nintendo's DS about $30, a top-of-the-line iPhone game typically sells for no more than $10. With traditional games, developers might wait a year or two between major releases; ngmoco is planning on releasing new versions of its games for the iPhone every four to five months. 'You have to think differently,' says Young. 'It's redefining what it means to be a publisher in this world.'"

3 of 325 comments (clear)

  1. Re:The games are $10 because they aren't worth mor by crazybilly · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Really, I have yet to see an iPhone game that captured my attention for more than an hour or two

    You spelled "Nintendo Wii" wrong in that sentence.

  2. Re:Attention Span = 0 by FishWithAHammer · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    Standing there doing nothing is not being patient, it is being stupid. Pulling out an iphone or the like for a quick video game is no different from picking up a book and reading in line (which I have done)--it adds activity to an otherwise inactive section of the day.

    I'd rather be talking to people, but people look at you funny if you smile and say 'hi,' let alone try to strike up a conversation.

    Thanks for playing, fuckbean.

    --
    "You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time."
  3. Re:The Other Shoe by TrancePhreak · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    ObjC is slow and not often used.
    The platform/tools are pretty standard.
    The types of games are very different from regular/bigger projects.

    --

    -]Phreak Out[-