“Get ready, because this one may get big: 44% of all iPad applications being tested on the actual device are games,” Jesus Diaz reports for Gizmodo. “Hey Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft, the iPhone/iPod titan is getting its tentacles all over the living room.”
MacDailyNews Take: It’s likely they’ve already figured that out already, Jesus. Well, maybe not Micorsoft.
Diaz continues, “The iPhone/iPod monster has positioned itself as the preferred mobile gaming platform for developers and is quickly becoming one of the largest game platforms in the planet, with 75 million iPhone OS devices sold in just 2.5 years. The current king of all game platforms sold 125 million units of the much cheaper Nintendo DS in five years and two months.”
“Now Apple is moving the action into the living room,” Diaz writes. “Would gaming be one of main purposes of the iPad? Would the iPad become the next casual home gaming juggernaut, like the Wii? The market will tell in time, but apparently developers think that the possibility is there.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “sn” for the heads up.]
“I like our strategy..I like it a lot”
“Someone please pass me another chair?”
Cha-ching..
IPad changes so much. All those companies are scrambling
iPad could also be a game controller for Apple TV? Stay tuned..
Seems as if Apple has gone from zero to lightspeed in very short order. However, the speed of unit sales for both companies is about the same!
“…not a very good email device”
Who cares Ballmy? Games are where it’s at yo.
If Diaz likes the iPhone so much, then truly, it is the “Jesus phone”. :p
Finally the other shoe dropped… after three years of iPhone OS.
The beautiful thing is that the iPad can almost literally be whatever you want. It’s up to the imagination of the developers.
Two of my favourite iPhone games are pool and pinball. Can’t wait to play them on the iPad.
@sid – do you mean ‘Wild West Pinball’?
I love that game!
mw – ‘having’, as in having a blast being a Mac user
*IF* Apple can position the iPad as a “gotta have” game device, they’ll clearly sell millions overnight and the rest of the entertainment media (IE: movie sales, books, etc) will ride that wave. If the iPad does not nail the gamer market, it will be niche device, bought primarily by wealthy Mac users to augment their home system.
Diaz is an idiot: Comparing iPhone OS sales to DS sales is a hype driven exercise in self delusion. Everyone who buy a DS, buys it expressly for gaming. Few iPhone buyers, who make up the bulk of iPhone OS sales, ever buy a true game.
There are several guys here who often come back arguing that for proper gaming, no (multi)touch-only device will ever beat “proper” handheld gaming device with proper controls (buttons, stick, switches, etc). They simply don’t get it. The hard core gaming audience is negligible. They may be huge fans of gaming (and represent disproportionate share of subscribers to “Gaming Monthly” magazines), but there are so few of them that their personal preferences really don’t matter. Vast majority of gaming population, the casual gamers, LOVES iPod/iPad/iPhone concept. With ultra-sensitive motion sensor as their controller, these devices bring perfect combination of usability and playability. Nothing else really matters.
The point is, these three devices will completely displace current portable consoles, which will end up niche products for devoted fan base. The rest of the world will be gaming on Apple’s hardware.
Since the iPod has both wired and wireless keyboards out of the box, I don’t see why game controllers could not integrate with the iPod.
That said, maybe the winning difference will be speed…from the native OS of the iPod and the A4 chip. Every review I’ve seen on the iPod emphacizes the speed and responsiveness.
@Brau,
Everyone who buy a DS, buys it expressly for gaming.
Duh. So, what? The point is that there are alternatives. If you don’t think the iPhone and iPod touch haven’t cut into PSP and DS sales, you’re very naive. People have a limited amount of money to spend on toys, and given the choice between a dedicated device that does one thing well (games) and a device that does a plethora of things well, many will pick the more value-packed device to spend their dollars on.
Few iPhone buyers, who make up the bulk of iPhone OS sales, ever buy a true game.
WTF are you talking about? That statement flies in the the face of both simple logic and the facts. Fact: The iPhone is NOT the “bulk” of iPhone OS sales. Fact: Developers are selling millions of games and making lots of money, so apparently both iPhone and iPod touch users are buying games. Everybody I know has half a dozen or more games on their iPhone OS devices.
I wouldn’t spend $20 on a DS for myself, but I’ve spent several times that on GAMES for my iPhone.
Add wide screen gaming and a webcam and you’ll have yourself a game changer.
Until then — FAIL.
What about this: the ps3 uses wireless Blutooth game controllers. The ipad has Blutooth… See where I am going with this? Wouldn’t it be nice if someone could write a driver for this. Imagine the possibilities of a real game with a real controller in two very portable pieces!!
“iPad could also be a game controller for Apple TV? Stay tuned..”
That’s the first thing I thought of when I saw the MDN ‘headline’- now we’ll see about this “hobby” …
Now why would I want to press retarded button, if I can interact with the game directly live in screen?
Re PS3 controller and iPad.
That would be two hands on the controller, lying on your back, with the iPad propped up on your stiffy.
You’re short one hand numb-nuts.
Interactive porn.
Gotta love the faithful.
“The hard core gaming audience is negligible. They may be huge fans of gaming (and represent disproportionate share of subscribers to “Gaming Monthly” magazines), but there are so few of them that their personal preferences really don’t matter.”
Did you miss the sales for Call of Duty 6? Stay tuned for sales on God of War III. Yeah we’re negligible.
The fact is for the cost of a iPad one could buy a PS3 / 360 + DS
The new nintendo DS (not XL) is supposedly amazing and has developers all excited. Nintendo is going no where.
While I am sure lots of kiddies will be attracted to the iPad for games their will be a lot of adult users who want the iPad as an e-reader and for productivity apps primarily.
This is the reason why I don’t like the name iPhone OS. When the iPad comes out, iPhone OS will be on 3 different products, and only one of them is the iPhone. Apple should have called the OS touch OS or something like that.
Predrag is right: the casual gaming community is orders of magnitude larger than the hardcore gaming community. You get a fraction of casual gamers to buy the iPad as a gaming device and you’ve sold more iPads than if 100% of hardcore gamers buy it. It’s not even close.
@ A Gamer,
Have you seen the profits that game makers get from the App Store? 70% of sales with less than 5% pirating of their software.
Sales will number in the billions.
Get back to your XBox 360.