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The Official iPhone/iPod Touch Gaming Thread

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I dont think there's a problem with the current system.

Judging by the game recommendation thread most of the best games are at the top of the list in their respective genre. Regardless of price.
 
60_gig_PS3 said:
I dont think there's a problem with the current system.

Judging by the game recommendation thread most of the best games are at the top of the list in their respective genre. Regardless of price.
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Like most things once you go down the list the sales start dropping quite a bit based on the information that many devs have given out. I wouldn't use that genre list breakdown as the best marker because it has tons of games in the wrong genres for one and the simple top 100 games overall is probably a better indicator in general.

Although I would be happy to see some current data from a dev based on sales across various rankings if they tracked such a thing.

I simply have a fundamental problem for a number of reasons with tracking sales rankings in the same way they track music when every music track is either 99 cents or 1.29 cents.
 
Stoney Mason said:
Like most things once you go down the list the sales start dropping quite a bit based on the information that many devs have given out. I wouldn't use that genre list breakdown as the best marker because it has tons of games in the wrong genres for one and the simple top 100 games overall is probably a better indicator in general.
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but how could it be better? The top 100 is really general so of course it's going to be dominated by casual games. So many non gamers with iphones you cant expect something like Zenonia to hold up in the overall top 10.

actually just checked and Zenonia is #45 overall which is pretty impressive.
 
60_gig_PS3 said:
but how could it be better? The top 100 is really general so of course it's going to be dominated by casual games. So many non gamers with iphones you cant expect something like Zenonia to hold up in the overall top 10.

actually just checked and Zenonia is #45 which is pretty impressive.
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Track based on revenue or at least something beyond the simplest marker of unit sales. That increases the influence and ranking of any app relative to their actual price point. This in turn gives them free marketing and more sales in turn for being more plentiful and being higher up on the list. Which in turn encourages more of this type software.

99 cent apps don't need extra marketing or a ranking system that is already stacked to help them get more advertising. Their price is all the advertising they need.

And how about a sort by customer rating score option anywhere on the App store for games or genres or actually making sure games are in the right genre listing period.

The general problem is that the app store is modeled on the template of their music store and while they can away with using it, it's really not the best template to use for selling games.
 
Flunkie said:
Introducing my Rolando 2 character..

Ernie the Explorer

d679a4609b459034c903c18a7f4305cf-small.png
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Would Ernie the Explorer want to be buddies with El Friendican?
2ccv23o.jpg
 
Stoney Mason said:
Track based on revenue or at least something beyond the simplest marker of unit sales. That increases the influence and ranking of any app relative to their actual price point. This in turn gives them free marketing for being more plentiful and being higher up on the list. Which in turn encourages more of this type software.
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Sure that would be more accurate but I dont think it would change the actual list by all that much.

The biggest problem I see is with price manipulation just to get to the top of the list.
But that didn't work for Peggle which is now off the top 25 ever since they went back to the regular price.
And Hero of Sparta just floated to the top when it went to 99c. But that's a temporary surge. Pretty soon it'll be off the list.

The current ranking system makes it easy to know when popular games go on sale.
So I actually dont mind it.
 
60_gig_PS3 said:
Sure that would be more accurate but I dont think it would change the actual list by all that much.
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I have no way of knowing exactly what the list would look like. But I do know it would potentially increase the ranking of every single game currently priced above 99 cents which in turn increases free advertising which in turn increases sales. If apple is serious about their platform, they want to encourage as many "serious" games as possible to expand sales because they will already get the casual and flash games for free. The area they want to expand into is the more traditional market in addition to that.

While I've always been a strong defender of the casual nature and core market of the iphone there is only so much you are going to get in a 99 cent app game wise. There is no reason to limit the market in that manner.
 
Essentially it's a one dimensional view of "what's good". It's only based on one variable that's easily tweaked. This is why nearly every application price drops at least temporarily within 3 months. On one hand I love cheap games, but on the other I don't think it's healthy in the long term. Apple could fix the problem by just simply adding more dimensions to the search and organization of the store. Ranked by user score is an obvious one. Rank by some sort of review site meta score is another (users tend to leave negative scores significantly more than positive). Also adding the option to filter top tens based on price stratification could also be good. The top 10 as it currently stands is dominated by 99 cent titles, but if you had the option to see a bigger picture, like the top 10 $5-$10 games you'd be able to find a lot more titles that would otherwise be completely missed.
 
Stoney Mason said:
Some more Rolando 2 Videos. Obviously don't click if you plan to purchase the game and want to come in completely fresh.

2m5nog9.jpg
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Everytime I see stuff from R2 I think how much I love the new design. It looks great, the 3d worlds and the new direction for the enemies. A lot less Loco Roco and a lot more ngmoco :D


kaizoku said:
I've only tried stuff like monkey ball, hero of sparta and they just make me think I'd rather be playing on a real games machine.

stuff like rolando strikes a good balance, but things like flight control, sally's spa and airport mania are my thing right now.

pinball and puzzle games too.
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Hero of Sparta is the worst "real" game by Gameloft in my opinion. Terminator, Battlefield and especially Castle of Magic are a lot better.

Need for Speed: Under Cover is great as is Low Gravity for racing, Assassin's Creed is a full blown platformer, Edge is an amazing isometric platformer, Zenonia as a RPG...there are a lot of better games that you should check out if you want to see what iPhone can do. Hero of Sparta and Monkey Ball are mediocre, early efforts. If you don't care for more hardcore games on iPhone, that's fine. But just know that Hero of Sparta and Super Monkey Ball is not the best iPhone can do!
 
Tiktaalik said:
but if you had the option to see a bigger picture, like the top 10 $5-$10 games you'd be able to find a lot more titles that would otherwise be completely missed.
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That's a good solution they just need one more tab for top 25 over $5.
 
Prezhulio said:
how much did it used to be? i haven't been seeing people listing as a must buy, but i really like the mass effect universe...
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Reduced from $5 to $3. Quite the discount for a game that was released a few days ago. :lol

Im' debating buying it. Supposed to be not that great, but only $3... tempting...
 
Grecco said:
ME is still 4.99
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It says $2.99 on the app store and PandoraBox. But when you click to buy it, it says $4.99 still. It does the same thing with Topple 2, which im' pretty sure is $1. On the main app page it has the reduced price, but when you go to buy it it still shows higher price. I think its just an interface issue.

Can anyone back me up on this?
 
lawblob said:
It says $2.99 on the app store and PandoraBox. But when you click to buy it, it says $4.99 still. It does the same thing with Topple 2, which im' pretty sure is $1. On the main app page it has the reduced price, but when you go to buy it it still shows higher price. I think its just an interface issue.

Can anyone back me up on this?
Click to expand...

You are correct.
 
lawblob said:
It says $2.99 on the app store and PandoraBox. But when you click to buy it, it says $4.99 still. It does the same thing with Topple 2, which im' pretty sure is $1. On the main app page it has the reduced price, but when you go to buy it it still shows higher price. I think its just an interface issue.

Can anyone back me up on this?
Click to expand...


In the app store its still 4.99. At least in the game page.

I doubt it would have dropped in price this quickly (And i would have been pretty miffed.) :lol
 
Grecco said:
In the app store its still 4.99. At least in the game page.

I doubt it would have dropped in price this quickly (And i would have been pretty miffed.) :lol
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If you do a search for it its listed at $2.99 on the search page. But then when you click to go to the game page it's $4.99.


I've seen this bug before.
 
I haven't played much of it, but Mass Effect is so far not all that great. Not only is the combat boring and uninspiring, and the cutscenes low budget and way below what I expect from an iPhone game, but the load times are completely and totally intolerable.

I really hope it gets better, but I seriously doubt that.
 
jrricky said:
Mass Effect? Really? I was gonna go buy it for $2.99 on impulse but you are making me weary. :/
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Generic tilt shooter that has it's framerate drop to 0 whenever you fire a missile. The story isn't even great either.

If you really want to play this game then it's only $3, maybe you'll find some fun in it. But I completely agree with IGN when they say it's horrible and not worth anyone's time.
 
Clever Pun said:
Has anyone spent any time with Kolonists (the settlers of Catan semi-clone)?
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Yeah I've played it for an hour or two....

Good stuff:
- It's Catan, or at least a decent version of it.
- I like the "workers" aspect, where you have to jockey for position with other players for resources (replaces the dice in the boardgame).
- Graphics are excellent, controls are great, just really looking good over all.

However, there is some bad stuff:
- No save or autosave. If you start a game, the only way to take a break is to lock the screen. You can't exit the app and play other games, make calls, etc, without starting over.
- I've had a couple crashes. Wouldn't be as big a deal if it autosaved.
- The computer isn't too hard to whoop up on. Needs multiplayer bad (which is supposedly forthcoming, but I bet it'll be a while)

In short, it's a fun, but broken, game for now. However once they get it patched up it'll be a must-have.
 
Slacker said:
Yeah I've played it for an hour or two....

Good stuff:
- It's Catan, or at least a decent version of it.
- I like the "workers" aspect, where you have to jockey for position with other players for resources (replaces the dice in the boardgame).
- Graphics are excellent, controls are great, just really looking good over all.

However, there is some bad stuff:
- No save or autosave. If you start a game, the only way to take a break is to lock the screen. You can't exit the app and play other games, make calls, etc, without starting over.
- I've had a couple crashes. Wouldn't be as big a deal if it autosaved.
- The computer isn't too hard to whoop up on. Needs multiplayer bad (which is supposedly forthcoming, but I bet it'll be a while)

In short, it's a fun, but broken, game for now. However once they get it patched up it'll be a must-have.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the impressions - the lack of auto-save is kind of a deal breaker for me right now, though. I never know how long I'll have to play!
 
Yeah I don't ge why people on here who should know better are being suckered into buying Mass Effect Galaxy. It's a poor cheap cash in. And unlike even Metal Gear Solid Touch which arguably was also a cash in, at least the mechanics are solid and fun in that game unlike Mass Effect Galaxy. Stop supporting bad games solely because they have a big name attached to them. It's bad enough the casual people are gonna get suckered with this one. Don't let the hardcore audience contribute to the screw job.
 
ARGH

Okay I'm not buying iPhone games unless they are on sale from now on.

I just bought Knights on Rush for like 5-6 bucks the other day.. now its $1?

Argh.
 
TurtleSnatcher said:
ARGH

Okay I'm not buying iPhone games unless they are on sale from now on.

I just bought Knights on Rush for like 5-6 bucks the other day.. now its $1?

Argh.
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Another bad practice apple needs to rein in although at least Knights OnRush has been on the market for a little bit. Mass Effect is a far worse case. It's a terrible idea to let companies drop their prices immediately after going on the market because it screws anybody who actually pays the full retail price on the product. You should have to stay at a set price when you enter the store for a set amount of time.

The other half is just the continuing de-evaluation of pricing that plagues the store and continues unabated. At one point I was against the premium app store (because of the rumoured 19.99 price point) Now it can't get here soon enough imo if they are indeed or ever were working on such a thing. Too many devs willing to chase volume. Another case of something that looks good in the short term for the platform because it gives us good games at good prices but in the long term isn't as we will never get certain franchises or certain types of games because of this and it creates the justifiable menality that you have.
 
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