I have dozens upon dozens of iPhone games, and virtually none of them are what I could honestly call “playable.” That won’t stop me from buying and enjoying them, they can still be fun, imaginative and beautiful. They’re also generally in the cheap-to-free price range, which helps make up for the fact that only a tiny minority of them appear to be compatible with human fingers, such as the standard-issue models that came pre-installed on my hand.
Let’s take Infinity Blade, for example. It’s got outstanding production values, it’s made by a first-tier developer, and the controls are straightforward: Your options in a fight are swipe for a horizontal slash, swipe for a vertical slash, or tap to shield/dodge. Reviewers have heaped praise on Infinity Blade, but I just can’t understand why. In my experience, the game consistently ignores or misinterprets all of those simple actions, giving me a vertical when I swear I voted for horizontal or flatly refusing to dodge.
How about N.O.V.A.? This Halo-flavored shooter is rocking a 94 on Metacritic, with reviewers calling the controls “fantastic” and “superb,” whereas I would call them “like operating a forklift in reverse while sighting a 12-pounder cannon.” You must vigilantly keep one thumb on the simulated analog stick to clumsily plod about and use the other to alternately smear across the visible play screen or tap the fire button—choose carefully between looking and shooting, or sprain your fingers trying to do both!
Oh, Plants vs. Zombies. I love you so much. But you have the same flaw as most iPhone tower defense games: Using my finger to drag and drop plants means that I can’t actually SEE where I’m dropping them, and suddenly a crucial peashooter ends up in the wrong position, which never happens when I play the PC version of the game. Somehow that didn’t stop the game from getting reviews that applaud its “pitch perfect controls.”
Don’t get me wrong: I honestly like these games despite their flaws, but I’m at a loss to understand why they and so many other iPhone games are consistently praised for their muddy controls.
I do have a theory, though, thanks to my recent playthrough of Deus Ex: Human Revolution. DE:HR’s plot deals with a corporate conspiracy to control the public by promoting the advantages of cybernetic implants while downplaying the chemical dependencies and bio-DRM measures that come with them.
When iPhingers become widely available—AND THEY WILL!—beware: You will finally be able to enjoy these games the way so many reviewers claim to. But will it be worth the price?
-Ben Freund
www.loadablecontent.com
The armadillo returns.
Sony is apparently experimenting with an AI tool that will play the game for you when you are grinding away. A PlayStation patent for “auto-play” mode would simulate your gameplay style in certain environments and apply them to skip that section completely. This technology would likely be built directly into the cloud-based PlayStation Network and be a new feature that subscribers would have access to.
Hah! Either will never happen or publishers will charge you to use this AI. This concept would only exacerbate the problem we already have with GaaS.
doesnt that concept already exist tho?
buy dlc to get a ahead in games? money, weapon and exp dlc come to mind but yeh. one more thing for them.to potentially charge for.
Usually, for GaaS/Seasonal games, you'll have to perform actions to earn specific in-game currency to buy things for events. Then they sell the currency with real cash or a third-currency to then buy the in-game currency items (it's honestly truly bloated to hide that they're cheating you out of money). With this, they'll just give you items if you do something 50 times or the like and then charge you to have the game play it for you. It's better, right? No currency shenanigans, just play the game and we reward you! But, the truth is they'll inflate the amount of times you have to play through content just to get the same thing.
Why?
Why not just remove the Grindy part?
I hope it's not an excuse to make them worse, but optional if you pay
This IGN blogger mode will allow 'reviewers' to play games like rest of us.
I will never forget watching GamingBolts spoiler video for Horizon FW and realizing they never played it. Made me wonder if they play games at all.
Duuro says: "I think the idea behind the movement is cool, but on the other hand, the execution and clear limitation of the platform somewhat undermine the whole thing."
Enjoyable read
It boggles the mind as to why would you put yourself through the trouble to play these games whilst we all know that they are not enjoyable (or barely playable) due to technical limitations.Do you hate yourself or something?Well don't hate him for your own sake. :(
'Don’t get me wrong: I honestly like these games despite their flaws, but I’m at a loss to understand why they and so many other iPhone games are consistently praised for their muddy controls.'
It's because those games are at least playable and to some degree, enjoyable. When you consider the sheer volume of crap apps/games the ones that somewhat live up to expectations will be praised.
Dragging and dropping in Plants Vs Zombies? Sounds like you're doing it wrong. You don't have to do that you can just select with one tap then paste with another. After completing PvZ on the iPhone (and PS3, and PC) I think the iOS implementation is perfect.
Nova probably has remappable controls? I don't know.. Dead Space was pretty flexible and easy to control too. I never noticed any input weirdness playing Infinity Blade either.. Oh well. I can see why no buttons is an annoyance though. I've not had a truly satisfying FPS experience on the iPhone yet.
Has it occurred to you (the author) that your hands may be unusually large?