Apple Reveals the Most Downloaded iOS Apps and Games of 2021

[Isengardtom]

Too bad Divinity Original Sin II is not in the list

 

[Sean.]

I did not know that. How odd. What do people use in the US, Messenger apparently?

iMessage between iPhones and SMS from Android to Android and iOS to Android. FB messenger is the other big one here.

 

[dwaltwhit]

I did not know that. How odd. What do people use in the US, Messenger apparently?

We use messages. The iOS app

 

[makitango]

This really shows Apple has a problem here. Gaming is a potentially extremely lucrative segment, but when we look at the top paid iPad apps, there is only one E ticket game, and that is a port of an 18 year old game. There is not much compelling here.

Remember the “What’s a computer?” ads? We may joke about the ridiculousness of those now, but there’s a flip side: the new iPads are very powerful, and have the screen real estate of a laptop. I have a 12.9” iPad Pro, and I use it way more than my computer. Also, I suspect the iPad is the most popular tablet by sales. Yet I struggle to find interesting games to play on it. Most games seem to target young children, or are low effort products. This very much reminds me of the Atari collapse of the 80’s , when low effort junk was shoveled out at high volume as cash dragnets. One can argue Among Us and Stardew Valley are exceptions, but these are more time-waster or social games that might or might not have been on the list if not for the pandemic.

The question arises then: why no killer app game for the iPad? Why no Zelda: Breath of the Wild for such a platform? Is it Apple taking too big a cut making top developers not seeing adequate return on investment? Is it because there’s too much variation between supported devices, and maybe Apple should have a separate Pro category? I’m not convinced of the latter, and I’ll explain why.

I’m not suggesting the iPad is the best platform for first person shooters. In fact, some of the best iPad games didn’t need huge graphics power. For example, The Room games were perfect for the platform. Unfortunately, they were quite short, and had no replayability. The Baldur’s Gate games work well on the iPad, and are fun for nostalgia, but they are really old ports too. One game I’d love to see on iPad would be Drawn: the Painted Tower. This is quite a sophisticated puzzle game with beautiful art, and would be well suited to an iPad. However, BFG does not have it on the app store, even though they developed an iPad port. I could see Diablo II remastered working well here if it could be optimized.

Really though, the iPad is a unique platform, and it deserves to have creative people coming up with great original games that cater to its strengths. There was a flurry of development when the iPhone and iPad first came out, with games like Paper Toss, Fruit Ninja, and Angry Birds exploring the capabilities of these emerging platforms. Since then, development has stagnated, and nobody talks about the iPad as a legitimate gaming platform, despite it’s growing capabilities and unique strengths. I’m particularly troubled that so many top games on the list seem to be effectively baby pacifiers, and Apple should be too. Young children do not directly purchase games or additional content, unless their parents are wealthy or stupid. Older teen and adult gamers spend a lot of money on games and content though, and are not alway on their computer. Apple, perhaps through greed or other policies, is stifling a potentially huge revenue stream. Are they making so much money they don’t care? I would think shareholders should care. And as a user, I’m tired of scrolling through the App Store with the intention of buying a new game and finding nothing to spend my money on.

Anyway, I’d like to hear your ideas about why game developers are neglecting the iPad.

Probably the core reason why developers cannot see the iPad as a reliable platform to code, game or do other complex tasks on is the fact that there is no virtual memory on i(Pad)OS. When your RAM is, say, 6 GB, and iOS already takes 2, the moment you go from 3.9 to 4.1 GB, your app's gonna crash.
With no OS-level safeguards in place to restore your last saved state, that is a no-go for gamers, professionals and all others who can't afford or won't accept losing progress.

Even ChromeOS supports that making it more safe to work there.

 

[TiggrToo]

Probably the core reason why developers cannot see the iPad as a reliable platform to code, game or do other complex tasks on is the fact that there is no virtual memory on i(Pad)OS. When your RAM is, say, 6 GB, and iOS already takes 2, the moment you go from 3.9 to 4.1 GB, your app's gonna crash.
With no OS-level safeguards in place to restore your last saved state, that is a no-go for gamers, professionals and all others who can't afford or won't accept losing progress.

Even ChromeOS supports that making it more safe to work there.

Poppycock.

iOS and iPadOS have always supported Virtual Memory, albeit with limitations as to backing store (swap).

Now Apple have also released the ability for app developers to request entitlements to enable their app to grab more memory when needed.

And finally apps don't just "crash" - they may lose some state information when switched, but if an application is correctly written it'll handle failed memory requests.

From 2013: https://developer.apple.com/library...tual/ManagingMemory/Articles/AboutMemory.html

 

[makitango]

Poppycock.

iOS and iPadOS have always supported Virtual Memory, albeit with limitations as to backing store (swap).

You're putting lipstick on a pig. Having a swap file is the definition of preventing data loss and using the hard drive to compensate poor RAM offerings and/or management.

And finally apps don't just "crash" - they may lose some state information when switched, but if an application is correctly written it'll handle failed memory requests.

Maybe if writing apps correctly is so important, we should leave it to the devs to allow users to activate the multitasking menu and leave their apps, no? Sure we can trust everyone to implement it right.

Genius suggestion to just hand over baseline OS responsibilities to devs.

Also, way to polish a turd by trying to downplay the crashing part. So a person who kills an animal is also just reducing the total number of breaths taken of said entity, right?

 

[TiggrToo]

You're putting lipstick on a pig. Having a swap file is the definition of preventing data loss and using the hard drive to compensate poor RAM offerings and/or management.


Maybe if writing apps correctly is so important, we should leave it to the devs to allow users to activate the multitasking menu and leave their apps, no? Sure we can trust everyone to implement it right.

Genius suggestion to just hand over baseline OS responsibilities to devs.

Also, way to polish a turd by trying to downplay the crashing part. So a person who kills an animal is also just reducing the total number of breaths taken of said entity, right?

So, Apple's own post about Virtual Memory on iOS is just a figment of our own collective imagination, then?

And yes, as developers we're expected to understand the limitations of the OS.

Not going to comment on your "animal" straw man argument.

 

[psac]

Probably the core reason why developers cannot see the iPad as a reliable platform to code, game or do other complex tasks on is the fact that there is no virtual memory on i(Pad)OS. When your RAM is, say, 6 GB, and iOS already takes 2, the moment you go from 3.9 to 4.1 GB, your app's gonna crash.
With no OS-level safeguards in place to restore your last saved state, that is a no-go for gamers, professionals and all others who can't afford or won't accept losing progress.

Even ChromeOS supports that making it more safe to work there.

Poppycock.

iOS and iPadOS have always supported Virtual Memory, albeit with limitations as to backing store (swap).

Now Apple have also released the ability for app developers to request entitlements to enable their app to grab more memory when needed.

And finally apps don't just "crash" - they may lose some state information when switched, but if an application is correctly written it'll handle failed memory requests.

From 2013: https://developer.apple.com/library...tual/ManagingMemory/Articles/AboutMemory.html

I'm not a developer, and I know squat about what the virtual memory can or can't do, but I've been playing Genshin Impact on my iPad Mini 4 for a good year now, and that game is playable cross-platform including the latest Playstation. If the iPad can handle that game, it should be able to handle pretty much anything.

And does it crash occasionally? Yes. And it seems to fluctuate with releases, as if they figure out what's causing it and fix it, because even now it hasn't happened in a while. But when it does, I really don't lose anything, and if so, it's maybe a minute or two of catch-up, nothing significant at all.

 

[makitango]

I'm not a developer, and I know squat about what the virtual memory can or can't do, but I've been playing Genshin Impact on my iPad Mini 4 for a good year now, and that game is playable cross-platform including the latest Playstation. If the iPad can handle that game, it should be able to handle pretty much anything.

And does it crash occasionally? Yes. And it seems to fluctuate with releases, as if they figure out what's causing it and fix it, because even now it hasn't happened in a while. But when it does, I really don't lose anything, and if so, it's maybe a minute or two of catch-up, nothing significant at all.

Virtual memory is when you use disk space to virtualize memory that you do not have. In the gaming world this would mean that if your device has enough memory to render, say, world 1 of an RPG, it will crash the game once you enter world 2.
Worse scenarios would occur if you‘re working on a project that nets you money, which is why professional app suites stay away from mobile OS‘ if they cannot rule out that user data can exceed the memory Apple provides on supported devices.

On desktop OS‘, your application will seize to work if your hard drive runs out of space, here it will run out way sooner because RAM on mobile devices is severely limited.

Your game could have better graphics if virtual memory was allowed because the devs would not need to be afraid that hi-res textures would force-crash their game once they reach the relatively low RAM threshold.

As for productivity, professional app developers prefer not to invest into iOS solely because there will be no restoring saved app states if an app crashes during an autosave - it will end up being a corrupt file and you will have to start from scratch. And that’s a no-go in the work world.

They know this and no single dev wants to be the first to take that hit, especially if those are not exactly the pioneers of resource-friendly programming (such as Adobe). Customers will think this is the developer‘s fault when in fact it is the consequence of the OS being hamstrung in a very important area.