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The Official iPhone/iPod Touch Gaming Thread

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Has anyone played Drift Sumi-e?. The art is pretty awesome, it's kinda Okami-esque. It's like a line game racer so pretty simple but it's only .99$

8ea1f_drifts.jpg
 
John Harker said:
Has anyone played Drift Sumi-e?. The art is pretty awesome, it's kinda Okami-esque. It's like a line game racer so pretty simple but it's only .99$

8ea1f_drifts.jpg
Yeah, I have. Really like it. There's not a great deal to it, but it looks lovely which makes up for a lack of content - hopefully there'll be more sometime. Don't regret buying it at 59p at all.
 
I haven't been playing much, but the last thing I was working on was getting all the items on Sword + Poker. Just two more shields to go, I think I only have to do the last floor like... 12 more times...
 
bjork said:
I haven't been playing much, but the last thing I was working on was getting all the items on Sword + Poker. Just two more shields to go, I think I only have to do the last floor like... 12 more times...

Holy crap. I gave up when I got the last weapon and shield, but never thought I'd go back and get ALL the items.
 
mrkgoo said:
Holy crap. I gave up when I got the last weapon and shield, but never thought I'd go back and get ALL the items.

It's the OCD or whatever. If I play and get everything, I know I can say I'm "done" with a game and never "need" to play it again unless I want to. Some games that's not possible, like say Canabalt. For those I pick a score and see if I can reach it. But if I can 100% something, I will.
 
Could never sell my dsi - it's my mario bros multiplayer machine

slightly regretting the PSPgo though. Would sell it but I have a ton of DD games that I can't really sell on as they're tied to the same account as my PS3. Any way to move them to a different account so I could include those in a sale?



In an attempt to keep things on topic, do people think the extra power in the 3rd gen touch will start to be used more widely? Also curious to see what they do with the 4g. If they add a camera I'll probably update from my 2g and pass this down to my kids
 
mrklaw said:
Could never sell my dsi - it's my mario bros multiplayer machine

slightly regretting the PSPgo though. Would sell it but I have a ton of DD games that I can't really sell on as they're tied to the same account as my PS3. Any way to move them to a different account so I could include those in a sale?



In an attempt to keep things on topic, do people think the extra power in the 3rd gen touch will start to be used more widely? Also curious to see what they do with the 4g. If they add a camera I'll probably update from my 2g and pass this down to my kids
With so many regular iphone and touch users out there I don't think it will be for a while yet but it would be nice for a dev to add in little extras for the more powerful platforms, I think gameloft's avatar improves the water and adds some bloom glow if you are on a 3g touch or 3Gs, more games need to do this, just like pc game scaling :)
 
Diablohead said:
With so many regular iphone and touch users out there I don't think it will be for a while yet but it would be nice for a dev to add in little extras for the more powerful platforms, I think gameloft's avatar improves the water and adds some bloom glow if you are on a 3g touch or 3Gs, more games need to do this, just like pc game scaling :)
The 4G - won't be called that, but - will be out between July to September, as always, and it'll feature a processor bump, probably to using the processor that's in the iPad. And that'll bring a bigish graphics leap if devs want to use it, which'll mean more scaling for the slower 3GS and 3G. I wouldn't be shocked to see iPad/4G only apps starting to appear when that happens as well.
 
whatevermort said:
The 4G - won't be called that, but - will be out between July to September, as always, and it'll feature a processor bump, probably to using the processor that's in the iPad. And that'll bring a bigish graphics leap if devs want to use it, which'll mean more scaling for the slower 3GS and 3G. I wouldn't be shocked to see iPad/4G only apps starting to appear when that happens as well.
This is the reason I've been holding off on buying a new iPod Touch, at the moment I'm not seeing the power of the current ones really being made use of.
 
Kamaki said:
This is the reason I've been holding off on buying a new iPod Touch, at the moment I'm not seeing the power of the current ones really being made use of.

The main reason developers aren't utilizing the full power of the 3GS is that they're having to back port their games/apps to the 1G and 2G phones. The same thing will happen when the 4G or whatever comes out.
 
Hey people, I was gifted an iPod Touch for my birthday today and I was wondering: should I wait for deals or just buy the games that I want?

I'm currently interested in Civ Revolutions and Plants vs Zombies. Of course, other recommendations are welcomed (specially for strategy games)
 
RJT said:
Hey people, I was gifted an iPod Touch for my birthday today and I was wondering: should I wait for deals or just buy the games that I want?

I'm currently interested in Civ Revolutions and Plants vs Zombies. Of course, other recommendations are welcomed (specially for strategy games)


Check out appshopper.com. It shows the price history of the apps you are interested in. You can see if there is a history of price drops, and if so just wait for the next one. You'll probably be waiting for a PvZombie price drop for a loooong time though. I'd just buy that one now

I was stingy at first too, but then you realize....a lot of this shit is just 99 cents and more than worth it, heh. You probably have 99 cents under your car seat
 
OneEightZero said:
The main reason developers aren't utilizing the full power of the 3GS is that they're having to back port their games/apps to the 1G and 2G phones. The same thing will happen when the 4G or whatever comes out.
That's why I think we'll get iPad/4G-only games. I think those devices will play 3G/S games, but the newer games won't play on the older hardware. Sooner or later Apple will draw a line under the old devices - otherwise the hardware base will never grow - and I suspect that this year, after being available for 3 years, with those 3 year old handsets having to play current software, that line'll be drawn. Honestly, I wouldn't recommend that anybody bought a touch or iPhone for the next few months, because I just can't see the next upgrade being as piddly as the 3GS one was - especially given that Apple are making their own chips now, cheaper and faster than anything they've used in portable devices before.
 
Leondexter said:
Dacvak said:
-=-Hey iPhone GAF-=-

Just a nice reminder of our awesome iPhone Game List created by GAF members, and able to be edited by all! Sign your name on a particular game you like, or add your own game to the list!

It can be found HERE.
Thanks for this, it's exactly what I came into the thread to find. I got an iPhone last week, and so far my gaming experience ranges from 'not too bad' to 'who could possibly think this is playable?'. There's got to be something out there that can get a better reaction from me than that. So here's my starting point. Thanks again.
Speaking of this, Benedict and KnuckaWut, add descriptions to the games you added!

I'm keeping my DB* (http://hippotrouble.com/iphonedb/) in sync with the GAF one but can't add stuff with missing info.

*Also open to all, just posted on other places like SA and Ars as well.
whatevermort said:
That's why I think we'll get iPad/4G-only games. I think those devices will play 3G/S games, but the newer games won't play on the older hardware. Sooner or later Apple will draw a line under the old devices - otherwise the hardware base will never grow - and I suspect that this year, after being available for 3 years, with those 3 year old handsets having to play current software, that line'll be drawn. Honestly, I wouldn't recommend that anybody bought a touch or iPhone for the next few months, because I just can't see the next upgrade being as piddly as the 3GS one was - especially given that Apple are making their own chips now, cheaper and faster than anything they've used in portable devices before.
The line will likely start at the 3GS/3rd gen touch, for technical reasons. The 3GS upgrade was a huge one, nothing piddly about it. CPU was a new generation on top of the clock boost, GPU was much faster and OpenGL ES 2.0 capable, RAM was doubled**, hell even the flash memory is faster from what I hear (so reading/writing is faster). On top of that you have all the little feature upgrades like video and compass and stuff. I can't see the next one being as huge in relative terms (because the 3G was really bad in comparison, amplifying how big the upgrade was), but that doesn't rule out significant upgrades.

I think spec wise a huge jump would be something like moving to the newer multicore parts (both CPU and GPU) but I doubt that's happening. The iPad appears to have a faster clocked CPU of the same generation...the GPU upgrade seems pretty beefy though. It's pushing over 4x the pixels, and the upgraded game demos were supposedly more detailed and running smoother than the iPhone equivalents.

** Technically in practice it's a much bigger deal than just 2x:
http://www.taptaptap.com/blog/the-impact-of-the-iphone-3gs-ram-increase/
At a glance, you’ll notice that the RAM in the 3GS doubled from past iPhone models. Twice the amount of RAM than you’ve had is never a bad thing, but the reality here is far more noteworthy… The older iPhone models have been often considered underpowered when it comes to RAM, so even though the RAM amount is technically doubled, in actual use, you’ll often be working with 4x to 10x the amount of free RAM.
Another thing to keep in mind, the 3G is still being sold, not to mention the 2nd gen touch. Going by some data from a Freeverse employee in January (...before they were gobbled up by ngmoco), the 3G and 2nd gen touch were still the majority. They may be old but the fact is they're still selling now, behold the power of the cheapest products!

I'm guessing the 3GS will take the $99 spot, but there's another interesting possibility on top of that...the 3G moving down to the free phone level. It'd be un-Apple like, but so was keeping the 3G/2nd gen touch around.
 
japtor said:
Another thing to keep in mind, the 3G is still being sold, not to mention the 2nd gen touch. Going by some data from a Freeverse employee in January (...before they were gobbled up by ngmoco), the 3G and 2nd gen touch were still the majority. They may be old but the fact is they're still selling now, behold the power of the cheapest products!
How do I know my iPod Touch gen? I see nothing neither on the case or iTunes..
 
RJT said:
How do I know my iPod Touch gen? I see nothing neither on the case or iTunes..
When did you buy it?

If you bought it after last september 2009 and it's over 16gig big you have a 3rg gen, if you bought it between september 2008- september 2009 you most probably have a 2g touch, before then you have a 1g which has no built in speaker and you have to use earphones for any sound output.

whatevermort said:
The 4G - won't be called that, but - will be out between July to September, as always, and it'll feature a processor bump, probably to using the processor that's in the iPad. And that'll bring a bigish graphics leap if devs want to use it, which'll mean more scaling for the slower 3GS and 3G. I wouldn't be shocked to see iPad/4G only apps starting to appear when that happens as well.
I would be very shocked to see the ipad processor in a 4g, imo I can't see that happening this year and it's probably too big/hot to fit into a tiny little phone right now.
 
Diablohead said:
I would be very shocked to see the ipad processor in a 4g, imo I can't see that happening this year and it's probably too big/hot to fit into a tiny little phone right now.

Maybe. Though it honestly wouldn't actually shock me. They've been vocal about how cheap it is for them to manufacture, and the rumor mill seems to suggest that an underclocked - 600mhz - version of that chip would make perfect sense. (Apparently it's really quite small as it is, and underclocking it will make it run nice and cool, and save battery power.) As I say, it's been 3 years without a major line refresh, and that's a long time, especially for Apple, and especially in the mobile market...
 
Ok, I got all the weapons/shields/life upgrades from Sword + Poker. It actually only took about 90 minutes of replaying the last level to get the final two shields. Good times.

Next I need to finish Transformers G1 Awakening (stuck on mission 16), and do Textropolis without cheating or using any hints. I have all of the cities unlocked, but none of them are complete yet.
 
whatevermort said:
Maybe. Though it honestly wouldn't actually shock me. They've been vocal about how cheap it is for them to manufacture, and the rumor mill seems to suggest that an underclocked - 600mhz - version of that chip would make perfect sense. (Apparently it's really quite small as it is, and underclocking it will make it run nice and cool, and save battery power.) As I say, it's been 3 years without a major line refresh, and that's a long time, especially for Apple, and especially in the mobile market...
If it's the same generation ARM (which the A4 appears to be so far), at 600mhz it'll be on par with the 3GS' chip. And again, the 3GS was a major major refresh (see my tirade above), I don't get why you think it isn't. Do you need a new shell to convince you it's an upgrade or something?
 
japtor said:
If it's the same generation ARM (which the A4 appears to be so far), at 600mhz it'll be on par with the 3GS' chip. And again, the 3GS was a major major refresh (see my tirade above), I don't get why you think it isn't. Do you need a new shell to convince you it's an upgrade or something?

I had that discussion last year when the 3GS was announced, and eventually released. At the time, I said that it was a much bigger leap forward than going from the 2G to the 3G iPhone, but there were some around here who just didn't buy it.
 
cjelly said:
Not bad considering the cost of iPhone games compared to DS and PSP titles.

Yeah, I'd like to see a "by amount" graph instead of by revenue. I think the PSP slice would be almost invisible. *Indian tear*
 
rezuth said:
Awsome!

Also saw this today

flurryportablegames.jpg

yeah, I just saw this. incredible.

Poor PSP. their software revenue went from four times the iPhone to half the iPhone’s revenue in one year.

that is INSANE. I never expected it to be that bad for Sony’s system.

I have high hopes for more quality software on the iPhone. If capcom and SE can success at 10 dollar price points, it won’t freak out other big publishers to put up their IP on the system in major way.
 
mrkgoo said:
The question is whther the iPhone has stolen revenue, or just expanded the market.

mainly market expansion. from the techcrunch article:

A new report coming out later today from mobile app analytics company Flurry puts a number on the iPhone/iPod Touch videogame industry. In 2009, Flurry estimates that $500 million worth of games were sold through the App Store in the U.S., up from $115 million in 2008.


if revenue from the other devices was about the same (and I think sales were a bit flat YOY from what I remember of NPD numbers) then you get the iPhone gobbling up revenue percentages.
 
LCfiner said:
yeah, I just saw this. incredible.

Poor PSP. their software revenue went from four times the iPhone to half the iPhone’s revenue in one year.

that is INSANE. I never expected it to be that bad for Sony’s system.

I have high hopes for more quality software on the iPhone. If capcom and SE can success at 10 dollar price points, it won’t freak out other big publishers to put up their IP on the system in major way.

That's what happens when Sony rests on its laurels while Apple sneaks up behind and starts to kick tail. It will be interesting to see what Sony has up its sleeves at E3, though.

mrkgoo said:
The question is whether the iPhone has stolen revenue, or just expanded the market.

I'd say both, probably. As much as I love the PSP, I still don't buy the PR that Sony spits out about "people buy an iPhone and THEN a PSP because they want deeper titles".
 
Gamecocks625 said:
I'd say both, probably. As much as I love the PSP, I still don't buy the PR that Sony spits out about "people buy an iPhone and THEN a PSP because they want deeper titles".
Even if that were true, Sony has a serious problem. The iPhone is starting to get deeper titles of it's own, as well as ports from both handhelds.
 
Gamecocks625 said:
That's what happens when Sony rests on its laurels while Apple sneaks up behind and starts to kick tail. It will be interesting to see what Sony has up its sleeves at E3, though.



I'd say both, probably. As much as I love the PSP, I still don't buy the PR that Sony spits out about "people buy an iPhone and THEN a PSP because they want deeper titles".

Maybe if they actually figured out their digital distribution service, they'd be okay... I'm still waiting for BlazBlue to hit PSN!
 
Gamecocks625 said:
That's what happens when Sony rests on its laurels while Apple sneaks up behind and starts to kick tail. It will be interesting to see what Sony has up its sleeves at E3, though.
An even more expensive PSP!
Tobor said:
Even if that were true, Sony has a serious problem. The iPhone is starting to get deeper titles of it's own, as well as ports from both handhelds.
Speaking of which, anyone see the hilariously blatant Layton ripoff?

Deliverance looks pretty good, although I may be swayed because it reminds me of the races in Blast Corps way back and I'm a sucker for top down racers.
 
japtor said:
If it's the same generation ARM (which the A4 appears to be so far), at 600mhz it'll be on par with the 3GS' chip. And again, the 3GS was a major major refresh (see my tirade above), I don't get why you think it isn't. Do you need a new shell to convince you it's an upgrade or something?

Well, actually, I just needed somebody to explain that - most articles seem to suggest that the iPad chip, even underclocked, would be significantly faster. If it wouldn't, then that's fascinating. Perhaps the reason that the 3GS isn't seen as a major major refresh - or perceived as one - is that there's been precious little released to suggest that it was? Clumsy analogy, but if you play Monkey Island on a system designed for Crysis, it'll only persuade me that the system is designed for Monkey Island.

So here's a question: Apple, a hardware manufacturer, want me - the consumer - to upgrade my hardware. How do they make me do it if I cannot see any reason to this cycle?
 
I would still like to have a PSP and a DS again, but only for a few titles that aren't on the ipod. I was never really high on ipod games in the click-wheel days, but the touch is so easy to use and the games load fast even on my 8gb, it really has changed my gaming habits.
 
whatevermort said:
Well, actually, I just needed somebody to explain that - most articles seem to suggest that the iPad chip, even underclocked, would be significantly faster. If it wouldn't, then that's fascinating. Perhaps the reason that the 3GS isn't seen as a major major refresh - or perceived as one - is that there's been precious little released to suggest that it was? Clumsy analogy, but if you play Monkey Island on a system designed for Crysis, it'll only persuade me that the system is designed for Monkey Island.

So here's a question: Apple, a hardware manufacturer, want me - the consumer - to upgrade my hardware. How do they make me do it if I cannot see any reason to this cycle?
No one is 100% on the chip, but "sources" (better than nothing!) point to it being the same core. This Ars article covers the whole chip situation well. It sounds likely that they only included what they needed on the chip:
It's lean and mean to a degree that isn't possible with an off-the-shelf SoC.
The previous chips they used (Samsung iirc) had a whole bunch of extra stuff that they'd never use. Also there's a possibility they used some special power saving tricks but that's all a mystery.

As far as specs, they don't push it cause most people don't give a shit about what CPU and RAM their MP3 player has. Realistically as long as something works, none of the details matter. They told you the 3GS was faster from the start. Go to the iPhone page, the first thing it says is "The fastest, most powerful iPhone yet" and "The fastest iPhone ever: Load webpages, launch apps, and more - even faster" before going into the feature additions.

If they said "The iPhone 3G has an ARM11 core at 400mhz with a PowerVR MBX lite, while the new 3GS has an ARM A8 Cortex at 600mhz with a PowerVR SGX 535" would it help? Does anyone outside of the nerd community even know what the ARM CPUs or PVR GPUs are, much less the different cores? And if anything the mhz is a disservice to it cause it doesn't show how big the actual performance difference is.

Their specs for devices mostly come down to storage size or basic features, cause people are directly affected by that stuff in an obvious way. They don't need to know all the technical details of how the 3GS is faster, as long as it really works faster.

I think it isn't seen by some as a substantial upgrade cause what I said a while back, it looks the same as the 3G. Even in the name, it's 3GS, "it's just a faster 3G." Granted it's a much faster 3G and has more features, but if you just glanced at one you'd have no way of telling it was completely new because it looks 99% the same on the outside.
bjork said:
I would still like to have a PSP and a DS again, but only for a few titles that aren't on the ipod. I was never really high on ipod games in the click-wheel days, but the touch is so easy to use and the games load fast even on my 8gb, it really has changed my gaming habits.
What I would kill for is being able to load all the games internally or download them...Sony had the right idea but they screwed up in completely ditching the format firmly established for the system. Other than being on me all the time cause it's a phone, it's just more convenient to play stuff on the iPhone cause I don't have to deal with finding media to play whatever game.

It'd never happen but 3DS + SD slot for game storage would be awesome. Download games directly to it, or buy the usual cart and transfer over...there'd have to be some crazy DRM to pull that off without getting screwed, but I'd love to see it.
 
japtor said:
What I would kill for is being able to load all the games internally or download them...Sony had the right idea but they screwed up in completely ditching the format firmly established for the system. Other than being on me all the time cause it's a phone, it's just more convenient to play stuff on the iPhone cause I don't have to deal with finding media to play whatever game.

It'd never happen but 3DS + SD slot for game storage would be awesome. Download games directly to it, or buy the usual cart and transfer over...there'd have to be some crazy DRM to pull that off without getting screwed, but I'd love to see it.

Same. I was happy enough when the DS had a GBA slot too, but having a bunch of stuff in the palm of your hand is nifty. Though, I think it's more useful on the ipod since so many games are intended for short burst playstyle, where on DS I'd be good with just a Pokemon or whatever.
 
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