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Apple iPhone: where’s the games?
Wednesday, 10 January 2007 — by Wayne Smallman
During the course of the Macworld keynote announcement of the Apple iPhone, a friend and I watched the transcript from the event and tried to guess what might be coming next:
“You know what’s coming next? Video games…” I type quickly into Skype, hoping to be ahead of the announcement. In addition, I made reference to Electronic Arts getting involved in producing games for the current iPod.
Now, for a guy like Carl – level-headed, not one for taking to the air on a whim or fancy – to commit to buying the Apple iPhone once it arrives on this fair isle is a testimony to the persuasive nature of the iPhone .. Carl is sold!
Thing is, there was no mention of video games for the Apple iPhone at all in the transcript. However, I’ve yet to sit through the video of the keynote presentation. So maybe news of the iPhone’s gaming potential lurks in there somewhere.
Making the right call
Since the news broke of the Apple iPhone, the traffic to this ‘blog has spiked somewhat.
Having skimmed through the traffic statistics during and then subsequently after the event, I found many Google search queries along the lines of: “iPhone games” and: “Where are the iPhone games”, as well as searches for Jeff Han, the guy behind the multi-touch screen technology.
Good question! Just where are the Apple iPhone games?
My feeling is, the iPhone Mk. 1 is ostensibly a business ‘prosumer’ tool, not a games platform, despite the obvious temptation to imagine Apple taking on the likes of Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo et al.
However, this is the here & now, and things could change. So none of this is to preclude a future iPhone Mk. 2 sporting enhanced graphics for video games.
As we’ve seen, Apple now likes to break out their product lines into non-overlapping matrices, and with the iPhone offering such a huge canvas to work on, the sky really is the limit.
Entertainment in your pocket
So for now, with such relatively small storage, the Apple iPhone is one or maybe two movies, some of your songs, some of your photos, most of your contacts and bookmarks in your pocket.
But the Apple iPhone is pretty much also an all dancing and all singing PDA and media player with oodles of potential, too!
There’s been speculation that Microsoft are working on a Xbox portable, and the iPhone must be a huge concern for them, since at any given moment, Apple could just move up a gear and leave a tremendous amount of clear blue water between the two of them.
However, that’s on the device side of things. As for actual content, Microsoft are stood on a pretty big hill clutching some pretty major contracts in one hand and a sack of cash in the other.
But then Apple do have interest of Electronic Arts, a lot of guts and plenty of eyes looking in their direction, right now.
So having seen Apple pull the proverbial white rabbit out of the hat on the music side of things, and now seeing Apple with a firm grip of the second white rabbit that is video, who knows?
Recommended reading
- Apple iPhone is here…
- Apple iPhone: the game is on
- Tech’ news in brief: Apple iPhone rumour round-up
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I would say games are coming, but I don’t think now. Because they have to design games for the touchscreen and make it Apple-like. Maybe another problem will be the performance. Simple games are no problem, but games for the brilliant display aren’t easy. Let’s have a look here.