The iPhone: The New Force in Portable Gaming?

The RePortable Vol.1 No.8

IPhone As A Portable Gaming Platform

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122644912858819085.html

Read that article and tell me Nintendo and Sony aren’t crapping their pants right now. Apple has announced that they’ll be making a concerted effort to bring a large amount of mobile games to the iPhone and has the likes of Activision/Blizzard, Id, and Sega backing them up.

Being in that 13 million iPhones have been sold and that a quarter of the 200 million apps downloaded from the App Store were games, I’d say Apple’s going to have a pretty strong foothold. Game companies will love this because it means that they get to keep 70% of the profits and not have to shell out money to make game carts and UMDs. There are already companies sprouting up that are specializing exclusively in making games for the iPhone. So those of you who poo poo the mobile gaming scene, GET READY TO EAT YOUR WORDS BEEYATCHES!!!!

Granted, the iPhone will never replace a DS or PSP as a gaming device, but it will certainly take a chunk out of the market of people thinking about buying either of these two devices. This is especially bad for Sony, as sales of the PSP-3000 have dropped off sharply in Japan. As a media device, it can already play music and movies like the PSP, and if we somehow start to see games that are as good as the PSP’s (which is highly unlikely but still, we mustn’t rule it out), Sony’s portable is dead in the water.

I think it’ll appeal to a lot more casual gamers, but this is a good thing. With the money developers reap from these mobile games, they can put those finances into console and portable software, which is a good thing for all of us.

In some ways, the iPhone is a more powerful device than either of our two beloved portables, with a great screen (with a better refresh rate than the PSP), and some serious technology under the hood. There are already many emulators available for it as well, so those predisposed to want to hack things will be able to enjoy NES, GBA, and MAME games.

The downside of course, is that the iPhone has no physical buttons, which could make gaming on it a difficult thing. Hopefully this issue will get sorted out in a logical manner, but regardless, the iPhone is going to be a major force in portable gaming, so get ready for it!