Why iOS devices get all the game tie-in love

The other day Kotaku reported on the announcement of a Mass Effect 3 iOS game. Unlike the last one, which was a top down, story-focused game, this one will be a third person shooter, with “full featured” gameplay. Someone in the comments complained about the lack of support from publishers and developers for Japanese-made handhelds like the Nintendo 3DS and Sony PSP and Vita. Why are games based on mega-hit console franchises, with mega-hit console franchise mechanics, going to phones and not dedicated gaming handhelds?

I asked that question years ago, when the iPhone was really picking up steam.  I would gladly pay a little more for that iPhone version of Assassin’s Creed or Dead Space if it was put out on PSN or the Nintendo eShop. I want to play those phone games, I really do, I just don’t want to play them on a phone, desperately wishing I had transparent thumbs. It seems a little unfair too, when an adaptation for a huge franchise gets released on phones and handheld gaming devices, and the phone version has more polish and is more fun than the crappy console port on the handheld.

But it’s all about business.

The reason iOS platforms get all the love has little to do with Japan or the handhelds made there. It's about install base and optimizing the amount of money that can be made in the shortest amount of time. There are a gozillion compatible iOS devices out there. For real. There were roughly more than 3.8 million iOS devices activated during the 2011 Christmas weekend alone. That is a huge market of potential customers. Yes, Sony has sold 70 million PSPs worldwide since 2004, and Nintendo has sold even more DS systems (in all their variations), but the install base is made up of very different demographics, and the ease of use—in terms of shopping and purchasing—on smartphones can’t be beat.

Everyone has a phone. Kids, adults, teens, oldsters, they’re all getting in on the smartphone game. The mindset people have when buying phones plays a big part in their success. Smartphones are phones that also happen to run games, not game systems that also happen to do other stuff (poorly). Smartphone customers come to their phones with app mindsets—thanks in no small part to Apple’s clever ‘there’s an app for that’ marketing—not boxed physical media games. That means they’re predisposed to getting more for less, and for their game time to come in bite sized chunks.

At five bucks developers and publishers could potentially make way more selling to those impulse buyers than at $40 to the smaller 3DS and Vita user base. There’s less risk and greater potential for reward. Five dollars for a game? No problem! That’s the same price as some coffee at Starbucks! Not to mention marketing for a phone game (if there is any) costs significantly less. Then there’s all that businessy stuff like certification and who gets what from the earnings. I can’t say for sure, but I’m willing to bet throwing a game up on iOS is easier than getting it up on PSN or the eShop (well, maybe not the eShop, Nintendo seems to let everyone through).

I have a Droid Razr, so I won't get to play the Mass Effect game, and yes that bums me out, but I can see why, from a business stand point, sticking with iOS makes sense. Each year there is ONE iOS update and ONE new iPhone. Make a game to match those specs, and maybe the specs from the year before, and you're good. With Android you have just one phone (the Galaxy Nexus) officially running the newest version of the OS, plus hundreds of different hardware configurations running several different versions of the OS. Making the game compatible with all those set ups would likely take longer than they care to spend. Plus there’s statistics out there showing that iOS users are more likely to pony up for a product than Android users.

So yes, it sucks that this game (and many of the other great franchise tie-ins) isn't going to something with actual controls. But business is business. Games go where the (easy) money is. 

How do you create your characters?

One of my favorite parts of starting a deeply customizable game, no matter the genre, is the character creation process. It’s weird that most games that involve high levels of customization and player choice lock you in to your character’s look within the first ten minutes. That’s why, when I first played the original Mass Effect I started over twice--I spent so much time on my character only to find him looking weird once I got him in the game. The second time he didn’t fit the provided voice at all and it drove me nuts.

“Fit” is probably what I strive for most when I create game characters. I used to do the predictable thing and try to create a character that looked like me, only cooler. But that got boring, because I’m an average height, average weight, white dude with short brown hair. I would end up creating the same guy in every game, and that same guy doesn’t fit in every game universe.

So my new philosophy (and by “new” I mean I’ve been doing this for a few years) is to make someone that fits the game and looks unique--but not hideous, because you know, you do have to stare at this person for the rest of the game. Sometimes it’s a crooked nose, a scar, or a heavy brow, other times it’s just a hairstyle I normally wouldn’t have chosen. The level of uniqueness really depends on the character creator. Some are deeper than others.

Take Saints Row 3 for example. The character creator in that lets you adjust your character’s septum. Septum! That high level of customization lets people do crazy things, like this:



That’s Bruce Willis! That guy’s channel is worth checking out if you have Saints Row 3. I followed the instructions to make Dwayne The Rock Johnson the other night. He’s got some spot on look-a-likes.

Here was the guy I made for my first run-through in Saints Row 3. He’s a British gangster named Nigel Gangsterton.

He’s not crazy unique, but he’s far from bland I think. I like my characters to be believable in the world they live in--which is why he doesn’t have shiny purple skin and a ponytail (though to be fair...that would be believable in Saints Row 3). Saints Row 3 is a rarity in that it lets you change the look and gender of your character at any time.

I generally go with male when there’s a gender choice, because it’s easier to slip into a character’s shoes if he’s the same gender, even if he doesn’t look like me. It’s the same reason I gravitate toward books with male protagonists like the First Law series by Joe Abercrombie (currently reading book two), over books like...well, anything my wife reads. I know a lot of people that do the opposite though. Why be a male when you can experience a story from a female’s perspective? Why look at the backside of a burly man when you can look at...you know.

So how do you create game characters? Do you make them look like you? Do you try to make someone famous? Do you go balls out crazy and just make someone super weird? Or do you go with the stock person? After flubbing two creations in the first Mass Effect I went with the stock male because I just wanted to play the game. He ended up growing on me and now I can’t see that voice coming out of anyone else. I also went with the stock female (pictured above) in the few hours I’ve played of Dragon Age 2. I made some light changes using a mod to remove the blood stain and change her eye color, but I thought her design was bold and interesting, so I went with it. What about you?

How to justify your gaming hobby

Years ago, when I was still subscribed to Entertainment Weekly, I read an interview with Ryan Reynolds. In the sidebar they had a quick Q and A about his favorite entertainment—books, movies, TV shows and video games. His answer for his favorite video game stuck with me, and also made me not like him:

“I don’t really play video games. Is there a way to waste more f—ing time? The Internet’s enough. The last videogame I played was Ms. Pacman.”

Burn. Forget about the fact that the dude that starred in turds like “Blade Trinity” and “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” called my hobby a waste of time. The speaker bothered me less than the words spoken. Video games are no more a waste of time than movies or books or any other form of entertainment. What’s more, they’ve had as much an influence (if not more) on me and my creativity as all of those other mediums.

Thankfully, as is the case with many hobbies considered geeky when I was a kid, gamers don’t have to justify their passion (as much) to others these days. The Internet has taught us that everyone is geeky about something, so if your special sauce of geekery happens to be video games, who cares?

Unfortunately some people still care—I usually call those people jerks. Some adults are shunned at work because they like World of Warcraft, and there are still kids punished by uninformed parents for playing those “murder simulators” all day. When I was a kid, games were still too new to have scientific studies. There wasn’t an Internet teeming with amazing articles and resources that could back up my claims that my hobby was more than a waste of time. Not anymore! Need to justify your hobby? Here are some resources:

Check out Jane McGonigal’s work: http://janemcgonigal.com/. She’s built a career on trumpeting the merits of video games and the skills they can help refine.

Want something more varied? Read this Lifehacker article, it’s stuffed with helpful academic links and it makes some good points too.

Want to show your Fox News watching family member that they’ve got it all wrong about video games? Check out this excellent post by Rock Paper Shotgun. 

Want to quiet some sneering coworkers? Show them these statistics about how many people are playing Facebook games. Better yet, point out the similarities between fantasy football and role playing games like Magic the Gathering.

Of course there’s always the hands-on approach: Pull out your phone and have your friends and family play a few games, or if they’re anywhere near a console, show them how awesome games have become. After just one round of Fruit Ninja Kinect, my dad was ready to buy an Xbox. My son was digging Angry Birds when he was just two months old. Gaming is so broad these days, so rich with different experiences, that it’s easier than ever to share it with others.

I remember trying to get my parents to understand just how much I loved video games and why they weren’t a waste of time. I used my allowance to pay for subscriptions to EGM and Next Generation and read each issue cover to cover. It wasn’t just about pressing buttons and seeing a guy on screen punch something. It was about the experience—the story, the journey, the challenge. And it was about the technology—the artists that drew the characters, the developers that wrote the code that made those characters move. I was fascinated by it then, and I still am now, and I would have killed for those kinds of resources.

[To their credit, my parents did an amazing job at managing my time with games and making sure I had a healthy relationship with them. I totally deserved that time they took away my Gameboy on that family trip to St. Louis—turned out going up in the arch was way more memorable than A Link to the Past.]

Of course you could always just get paid to play video games, but that’s not always as easy as it sounds. And I’m sure those that do it full-time have to deal with the occasional condescending comment (or hidden jealousy) of random people. Still, I remember writing my first paid review for Gamespot. Sweet, sweet validation. Video games weren’t a waste of time; they were a source of income! Ha! In your face Ryan Reynolds!

But seriously, in the end, you don’t need to justify your hobby to anyone. If someone criticizes you for being into video games, show them the resources above, and then kindly ask them what they fill their free time with. Everyone is geeky about something. 

The Imagination Enhancer - Available Wednesday!

Back in November when my brother and his wife and son were here to visit the baby I had him try out the demo for the Seasame Street game. My brother, being the wise father of a two year old, decided to give the demo a run-through after his son went to bed. 

They did not play it the next night.

The Kinect is a very cool piece of technology with some very real and very obvious limitations. The Seasame Street game gets around the "can't detect tiny hyper children" part by recognizing the adult as the player. The child can simply jump around and as long as the adult does the motions, the game progresses. It's a good idea, but it's not exaclty fun for the adult.

Double Fine, the developer behind the Seasame Street game (quick note for those that aren't into games, Double Fine doesn't usually make kids games, they make awesome games packed with humor and style) is about to release another Kinect game, one that celebrates the hardware's shortcomings.  It's called Happy Action Theater, and it's not so much a game as it is an imagination enhancer. 

Check out the GiantBomb.com Quick Look below featuring some of the Double Fine guys. Before I was a dad I would have just seen a bunch of dudes in their 30s doing ridiculous things and laughed, but now I see it and I think, "Man, if only my son could play this with me...but he just now learned how to roll over." So, consider this a public service announcement: If you have an Xbox 360, a Kinect and kids old enough to play something like this, you should get it, soon. Happy Action Theater comes out February 1 and it's just $10.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Bad Timing

Have you played the Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning demo? It’s an excellent case study for the importance of properly timing a video game release.

Reckoning (as I’m going to call it from now on) is a role playing game by Big Huge Games, a developer stacked with talented industry veterans. The game appears to blend the deep customization and stat-porn of RPGs like Oblivion and Fallout, the active, responsive combat of character action games like God of War and Darksiders, and the whimsical, vibrant art design of games like Fable and World of Warcraft.

As it turns out, some of the folks behind Reckoning also worked on some of the Elder Scrolls games, like Oblivion, and it shows. There’s a surprising amount of depth as you drill down into the character menus. From what I’ve played, the combat seems responsive and dynamic. Unlike most stat-based RPGs, the action in Reckoning feels more dependent on player skill, not on levels and behind-the-scenes dice rolls. And the art style is incredibly bright, lively and brimming with character—it’s a refreshing bloom of color in a dull gray winter.

It seems to hit all its targets. So Reckoning should turn out to be a great game right? Maybe.

The responses I’ve seen from the demo aren’t exactly positive. Yes it’s true that the game seems to be lacking a layer of polish—the menu UI feels very last gen, the Mass Effect style conversation wheel appears inconsistently throughout dialogue, and many of the non-combat animations feel a bit stilted—but I wouldn’t call it bad. It’s a fun game with a lot going for it, which is why it’s a shame that it’s being released now, and not in the summer or late spring.

The two games I hear Reckoning get compared to most are Skyrim and Fable. The Skyrim comparison comes up because of the talent behind the game, and because of the rich lore and customization those same talented individuals have boasted about. I’m not sure about the story yet, but Skryim crushes Reckoning in terms of UI with its elegantly designed and intuitive menu system. Reckoning’s menus are clunky and a chore to navigate, they lack the streamlined fluid presentation Bethesda brought to the table with Skyrim. Skryim is also a little more open, and less structured. If that’s a plus for you, then the slightly-more-focused Reckoning might feel stifling.

Then there’s Fable. Reckoning has a similar cartoonish art style, but I think they take it a step past Fable. Just look at the environments and animals, they’re all heavily stylized, and I think the game looks great—it’s not as derivative as some people say it is. The action-oriented combat is similar to Fable as well, but again, Reckoning wins the comparison. Fable’s one-note combat doesn’t hold up to Reckoning’s deeper, skill-based action.

As for the story, that remains to be seen. Reckoning’s got a heavy amount of lore—the game makes the fantasy mistake of dumping a dozen different gibberish names on you within the first five minutes—but I didn’t get much of a sense for the actual main-line story. I’m not even close to finishing Skyrim, but I’ve seen a lot of really cool narrative stuff there, so if Reckoning is going to compete, it needs to step it up. I’ve never cared for the stories in Fable games—couldn’t even tell you what the first one was about. I hate the way your hero has zero input, but can, for some “humorous” reason, fart on command. So in the story department, Reckoning already beats Fable.

And that’s the problem. Reckoning stacks up favorably against the Fable series, especially the polarizing Fable 3. But it’s not looking so hot next to Skyrim, and it’s way closer to the release of Skyrim than the last Fable game. I feel like the reception of Reckoning would have worked better if it was Fable 3 that came out back in November and not Skyrim. People would be saying stuff like, “this is what we wanted from Fable 3”, or “It’s like Fable, but better.” Instead they’re talking about how it’s like Skyrim, but worse, except for the combat, which is kind of cool. Not exactly a ringing endorsement. I know there’s business stuff going on in the background and you can’t just move release dates around, but still…bad timing.

I’m interested in Reckoning, but with so much of Skyrim still unplayed, and Mass Effect 3 just a month or so away, I doubt I’ll be playing it any time soon (it comes out next week). This would have been a great game to release in late spring or early summer. Far enough away from Skyrim and Mass Effect, or any big game in the genre, at a time where gamers might not be suffering from RPG fatigue.

Here’s hoping it does better than expected.