Those who doubt the value of the iOS platforms as serious gaming devices should take a look at some of the stuff that’s come out recently. The iPhone and iPod touch are becoming gaming powerhouses, and not just for portable versions of timewasters like Bejeweled Blitz and Farmville.
No, in just the last couple of weeks, we’ve seen some spectacular games show up. Epic’s Infinity Blade, for example, provides spectacular graphics and a cool update on, of all things, Punch-Out!! Trendy Entertainment’s Dungeon Defenders gives us an interesting multiplayer twist on both the action RPG and tower defense genres, despite being a little bit too ambitious for its own good on the small iPhone screen. (Stick with it past the tutorial, though; once you’re done with the screen-filling tutorial text, the interface is still a little bit cluttered, but less burdensome). Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light provides the same experience as the console and PC versions—complete with co-op. And Aralon is pretty much Oblivion in your pocket.
Stop and think about those for a minute. Those are all pretty fucking impressive games to run on a phone. Things get even more impressive when you look at the prices for each—the most expensive of those mentioned is Aralon, which is three English pounds and ninety-nine pence. Compare and contrast with Oblivion, which launched at £40 on consoles.
The thing is, though, the App Store and its customers appear to operate in some sort of weird parallel economy. Aralon‘s predecessor, Ravensword, sells for 59p and offers a pretty thorough RPG experience. And yet there are reviewers who say that they have “wasted their money” because it didn’t have one feature they thought it should have in it.
Seriously. These people need to get a little perspective. 59p for 20-30 hours of entertainment is pretty outstanding value whichever way you slice it. £3.99 for the same amount of gameplay is still pretty fucking amazing value. There are games that are considerably technically inferior to these games we’re getting on iOS devices now selling for £20-35 on the Nintendo DS. Ace Attorney on the iPhone is a tenth of the price it is on the Nintendo DS, and it’s the same game. Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light is 1200 Microsoft Points on XBLA, whatever that means. It’s 4 quid on the App Store. And again, it’s the same game—except it actually shipped with co-op built in.
iOS gamers, you’ve never had it so good. At some point, developers will figure out that they’re vastly undercharging people for these awesome games, and prices will rise. So stop bitching and make the most of these incredible experiences while they’re still the price of a coffee in Starbucks.