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General discussion"The mobile games market is an absolute mess, thanks to you" (A developer's opinion piece)(105 posts)(105 posts)
(105 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted October 21, 2015
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ET3D: How can anyone in their right mind play on anything else but touch? Touch is a lot more intuitive. Give a child touch, they'd immediately understand what to do. Give them a mouse or a controller, they'd need some practice to get it right.
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cal74: Let's say it's not black and white here. Touch is good for games designed for this kind of control (e.g.: puzzle games) while keyboard / mouse / pad are better for games requiring a more precise control (e.g.: arcade games).
In that case, what's Portal best played with?
Posted October 21, 2015
One game that is worth the price is Pewdiepies Legend of the Brofist.... Love that game!
Posted October 21, 2015
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Trilarion: I actually could imagine that adventures work well on tablets (not smartphones).
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jamyskis: You'd like to think so - it seems the most obvious candidate for touchscreen gaming - but sadly that's not really the case.

The biggest problem with most P&C adventures is that most interfaces are designed with a two-button mouse in mind. Because you can basically only apply a single action to any given on-screen object, this means that interfaces need to be designed so that everything can be done essentially with a single mouse button.

Similarly, many P&C adventures rely on the player being able to mouseover objects to identify them at ease, which you can't do on a touchscreen. ScummVM found a way around this by basically treating the screen as a touchpad for the mouse cursor, but that was fraught with its own problems and really was only a workaround solution.

I tried playing Beneath a Steel Sky and Broken Sword 2: Remastered, and in both cases I ended up going back to the PC version out of sheer frustration.
ScummVM works well on tablets. Like, the only reason I finished some adventure games was because ScummVM made them very easy to play on my tablet.
Posted October 21, 2015
The mobile market is for casuals.
Casuals are just that.. casual gamers. They're like vagabonds, moving from game to game. They'll find something they like, plop down for awhile, but eventually they will move on.
Once you've popped your thousandth balloon, or stole your millionth coin, the fire kinda goes out for those casuals.

The mobile market is seeing its downfall, like most of us predicted it would happen.
Posted October 21, 2015
The only thing is to vote with your wallet.

I haven't spent a dime on COC, despite it's so tempting to build things faster with gems (microtransactions). It doesn't mean I don't enjoy playing COC, it's just I don't want to support this kind of microtransactions.

I do however, have spent so much on Dota 2 - but their microtransactions don't give any advantages whatsoever.
Posted October 21, 2015
I don't like lattes, don't drink them. I'm not buying mobile games either, because I don't want to. Pretty sure that's me voting with my money right there.

... the hell is Pumpkin spice anyway? Give me coffee flavored coffee you haiku writing motherfucker.
Posted October 21, 2015
Are you sure you pick the right platform for your game?

Look what your game devs colleague has to say.

Stardock: "Our poorest-selling DLC for PC games generates more income than nearly every iOS or Android developer app"
Posted October 21, 2015
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zeroxxx: The only thing is to vote with your wallet.
Thing is, that's what the developer is saying. Or at least, that's what he thinks he's saying, or wants you to believe he's saying.

The reality is that gamers already have voted with their wallet. It's just that the outcome is not in his favour. There is simply little demand for games like that on mobile. Very rarely have I actually seen people clamouring for more in-depth experiences on mobile devices - such experiences seem more like an attempt to drive core gamers to mobile while ignoring the fundamental problems with the platform.

I know small-scale, freemium-casual and indie developers desperately want everyone to migrate to mobile where they don't have to compete with AAA titles or physical retail (why you do think we never saw the likes of Candy Crush Saga on PC?). But it seems to me that many of these developers are trying to release products that are designed to create a market rather than cater to one.
Post edited October 21, 2015 by jamyskis
Posted October 21, 2015
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yogsloth: I want the record industry to come back, too.

You know - musical product you can hold in your hands, enjoy the artwork, read the liner notes, and enjoy in high-quality sound. Build a relationship with. Fall in love with. Go to a record store and just browse and find something new to discover based on looks alone.
Funny you say that because I've just happened to know that some guy of my age is opening an "old-school" (well, physical products are old-school by now ^o^) audio cd's and vinyls store in the nearby city this week-end. I'll probably visit it next week just for the sheer nostalgia of browsing a music store... Reminds me that my first bought record was an Iron Maiden album just because of the album cover :o)

Sorry for the off-topic, let's get back to the first-world problems of gaming ^o^
Posted October 21, 2015
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cal74: Let's say it's not black and white here. Touch is good for games designed for this kind of control (e.g.: puzzle games) while keyboard / mouse / pad are better for games requiring a more precise control (e.g.: arcade games).
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Gengar78: In that case, what's Portal best played with?
A friend ;)
Posted October 21, 2015
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jamyskis: You'd like to think so - it seems the most obvious candidate for touchscreen gaming - but sadly that's not really the case.

The biggest problem with most P&C adventures is that most interfaces are designed with a two-button mouse in mind. Because you can basically only apply a single action to any given on-screen object, this means that interfaces need to be designed so that everything can be done essentially with a single mouse button.

Similarly, many P&C adventures rely on the player being able to mouseover objects to identify them at ease, which you can't do on a touchscreen. ScummVM found a way around this by basically treating the screen as a touchpad for the mouse cursor, but that was fraught with its own problems and really was only a workaround solution.

I tried playing Beneath a Steel Sky and Broken Sword 2: Remastered, and in both cases I ended up going back to the PC version out of sheer frustration.
That's sad to hear. Although I don't really understand what's going wrong there. I guess I have to try for myself.

Haven't the mouses for Apple computer also only one button? So if adventures run on a Macbook, they should also run on a tablet.

Finally, there are pens for tablets with buttons. For example one of my friends has a Surface Pro and with his pen he can write text, but when holding buttons on the pen he can also select or delete.

It should be possible but it might still need some time.

For example with just a touchpad and adventure games I could imagine that a single touch gives you options for a location which among others also include going there while a double touch or a swipe directly means go there and while a swipe on a selected item towards something means use it and the inventory comes up when swiping from a border of the display.

With the right design it should be possible.
Post edited October 21, 2015 by Trilarion
Posted October 21, 2015
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Emachine9643: One game that is worth the price is Pewdiepies Legend of the Brofist.... Love that game!
If the game concept is punching him in the face until your fists bleed, I can see the value in it.

As for "pay to win" games; you get what you pay for, and it's free...
Posted October 21, 2015
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Gonchi: I don't like lattes, don't drink them. ...
I like them but already before they became popular. :)
Posted October 21, 2015
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Trilarion: For example with just a touchpad and adventure games I could imagine that a single touch gives you options for a location which among others also include going there while a double touch or a swipe directly means go there and while a swipe on a selected item towards something means use it and the inventory comes up when swiping from a border of the display.

With the right design it should be possible.
Broken Sword 2: Remastered handled the mouseover problem by simply highlighting every possible interaction with the environment. The problem with this was that it looked absolutely horrible and removed a lot of the fun of exploring the environment.
Posted October 21, 2015
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jamyskis: Broken Sword 2: Remastered handled the mouseover problem by simply highlighting every possible interaction with the environment. The problem with this was that it looked absolutely horrible and removed a lot of the fun of exploring the environment.
That's not a good design. For example how would be the following: You swipe over the display and if you come close to a hotspot it kind of highlights for a short moment and you can memorize the position, then click on it. This kind of simulates what's going with the mouse cursor over a screen on a PC.

This would probably be much more fun and it would "only" require to programm a slightly different interface.

I think Broken Sword 2 then just did it all wrong.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussion"The mobile games market is an absolute mess, thanks to you" (A developer's opinion piece)(105 posts)(105 posts)
(105 posts)