A Week In Comments

You are in a twisted set of passages, every one alike.

Somebody else’s intellectual property is lying here, forgotten. It looks like it hasn’t been licensed yet.

> LICENSE THE IP

A Licensing Fairy appears before you. “Well, what do you have here?” It studies the intellectual property through a pair of spectacles, repeatedly consulting a tiny fairy-proportioned laptop computer. “So what are we talking? Live-action role play? Hot new reality TV show?”

> WEB-BASED CASUAL MMO

The fairy nearly drops its laptop. “That… uh… oh, what the hell. Can’t be worse than that Nemesis nonsense.” He produces a Certificate of Licensing and hands it to you, then vanishes with a *pop*.

I am afraid the mustache is a no go on the wii. Some italian plumbers fixed that gaming leak.

And there we have it – It’s an issue for some games but not others. As a developer, you have a choice between the DS, PSP, or the iPhone (Hypothetically). Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that they all have the same number of users, give or take a few million, not enough to make it worth developing for one device regardless of technical limitations.

Now, you have the iPhone. Touch screen, gimmicky, and given the cost of it, you know that a good 90% of the users will have disposable income to blow on apps. Say you don’t opt for a ‘clear button’ set because you realise that will obscure the game, as you cannot account for thumb sizes, so there could well be more unhappy players than there are happy ones. You also know that the device is, ostensibly, not exclusively a console – it has otehr features that it performs with a punishing lack of ability. It’s also a phone, and thus, is going to be constantly hunting for signal. It also has a nice batch of Wifi. So now battery life comes into question, as you cannot assume that everyone will turn their wifi off, or run their backlight at a low setting. Not to mention that the hardware probably was not put together with games in mind, so there could be hidden technical limitations. A fragile device.

Next you have the PSP. It’s big, it’s arguably ugly, and it could be considered difficult to carry, based on its size and design. Its battery life is okay, though. Yes, you still have the wifi and brightness to consider, but the battery packs are replacable by the user, on the move. It was designed with games being the primary design feature – Sony can claim otherwise, but that is the primary function of the device. The SDK has been around for a while, if you’re in the mobile game development business then you’re likely to have at least come across it once before. No major gimmicks, though. As with the iPhone, pretty fragile.

Lastly, the DS. Touchscreen, a popular gimmick. Excellent battery life, despite brightness and wifi, a pretty simply interface, and on top of the touch screen, a set of tactile buttons. Compact, sturdy design, cartridge based, while that might mean carrying carts with you, they’re light and unobtrusive. Designed exclusively for games, and has been around for yonks – Good stable development kit. Not as technically able as the other two, but still damned good none the less. Comes with mindles gimmicks – See microphone – and appeals to kids. Everyone knows kids nag like no other, and it’s very, very easy to hook kids into wanting something (See all the shit plastic toys that fly off the shelves around Christmas).

Which ones sound most attractive to a developer? DS is undoubtably on the top (Even more so given the real situation on sales, not just my hypothetical), with the PSP and iPhone tied in a state of ‘maybe’.

The reason people have the iPhone on them at all times is in its name.

It’s a phone. A mobile phone. Its main purpose is to be included in a mobile persons pocket. People don’t carry the iPhone around hoping for a really good game on the go – They carry it for phone calls.

*Looks above.*

Hey, I’m one of the first posts to not make a slash fan fiction reference…

… crap.