"French mobile phone games company Gameloft " that should be enough to tune out... if not, there is no date on that quote and it is reasonable to assume it was before the DROID sold 250,000 units in a week.
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Game Developers Scaling Back Android Efforts as iPhone Continues to Dominate
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Said it before, I'll say it again: Android gets great geek buzz, but as far as the general consumer market, nada.
That's why I'm always skeptical of these breathless reports about great sales of Android phones when they're released. "Wow! 1 million Android phones in xx days!" Yeah, wow. That was all that pent-up geek enthusiasm being unleashed at once. But after that, what do you have? Nothing.
You can't compete against a household name like Apple and iPhone by courting the geeks and the hardcore users while ignoring everyone else. Guess what the term "open source" means to the average user. Nothing. You don't create hype by talking about how open your platform is. Nobody cares.
The video game market is learning that same lesson as the Wii continues to dominate, much to the bewilderment of the hardcore gamer crowd.
That's why I'm always skeptical of these breathless reports about great sales of Android phones when they're released. "Wow! 1 million Android phones in xx days!" Yeah, wow. That was all that pent-up geek enthusiasm being unleashed at once. But after that, what do you have? Nothing.
You can't compete against a household name like Apple and iPhone by courting the geeks and the hardcore users while ignoring everyone else. Guess what the term "open source" means to the average user. Nothing. You don't create hype by talking about how open your platform is. Nobody cares.
The video game market is learning that same lesson as the Wii continues to dominate, much to the bewilderment of the hardcore gamer crowd.
If each generation iPhone isn't a huge step forward, it's probably because the things that are keeping users hooked on the phone have more to do with Itunes and the App store than HW specs. It tells you a lot that all the iPhone commercials out there don't even focus on the device - the commercials focus strictly on the third party apps you can put on it.
Most handset devs are still in the old school mode of thinking if they make a phone with better a better screen or camera, they have a chance of killing the iPhone. But the only way the iPhone will get some serious competition is if somebody creates a better iTunes/App store. Android being open source with a decentralized platform actually makes this more difficult because it makes the app development process longer. The fact the Android OS and Android phones are designed by separate companies also makes it harder because it fragments the user experience that Apple is able to control by doing everything in house.
Google manufacturing its own phone is a step in the right direction (they're following the Apple model, where they control HW and SW in the same product) but the app store needs to be refined and improved to the point that it's profitable and has a user-experience that surpasses that of Apple's. If this doesn't happen and they're unable to bring something new and unheard of to the table, they will fail.
I'd say it's potentially a life saving feature that you don't have multitasking on your iPhone.
What with your desire to be listening to Pandora, using your GPS to avoid construction messes, and talking to your wife on your phone all at the same time.
With multitasking you might even be able to play Peggle as well.
Yeah, cuz I do all that while moving.
I'm not that irresponsible, but thanks for giving me the benefit of the doubt.
The iPhone sold 7 million units in q3, or 530,000 units per week. And that wasn't its first week.
We have a product that is new and shiny and missed the AVERAGE sales pace of its older, similarly priced and network locked competition by 50%. That is not the trademark of a winner.
Like everything else built on Linux, Android phones will shortly be relegated to cost conscious markets and misguided hobbiests; an also-ran with a fantastic screen. Still way better than RIM, Symbian and whatever Windows CE is calling itself this month.
To me, the screen is just the same. It's bigger, but who cares if the GUI isn't as nice? It's higher resolution...so? Obviously it's nicer, but it doesn't defeat/cream/own the iphone's screen. It's just a newer phone, so it should have the most updated specs. Anyone who released their phone after the iPhone thathad WORSE specs would be failing. Droid is being released after the phone and its screen isn't completing stomping the iphone's into the ground, so it is in no way beating the iphone in that aspect.
The iPhone store doesn't have only games. True, games make up a majority of the applications, but the fact that many people use the App Store and buy things from there compared to in Android makes the difference. Soon, any new developer making useful apps will see the Appstore as the primary market to aim for, since many people buy things from there. You may not buy or play games, but there are probably apps in the Appstore that you do use or will use if they come out.
Personally, I think that a strong company like Apple uses itself for competition. In every video, they're always stressing about how to "make the product better than it was before". So you people don't need to worry about Google not catching up. As long as Apple follows the trend it has made in the past years, it will continue to produce excellent products.
The iPhone store doesn't have only games. True, games make up a majority of the applications, but the fact that many people use the App Store and buy things from there compared to in Android makes the difference. Soon, any new developer making useful apps will see the Appstore as the primary market to aim for, since many people buy things from there. You may not buy or play games, but there are probably apps in the Appstore that you do use or will use if they come out.
Personally, I think that a strong company like Apple uses itself for competition. In every video, they're always stressing about how to "make the product better than it was before". So you people don't need to worry about Google not catching up. As long as Apple follows the trend it has made in the past years, it will continue to produce excellent products.
I sold my iPhone and got the Droid less than I sold the iPhone for. So the money issue wasn't even a worry.
I'm not saying the Droid is superior to an iPhone, it's just does what I need better than the iPhone did. I actually felt my old blackberry handled mail/IM better than the iPhone did too though.
what exactly do you need that the iphone can't do?
and how exactly is the RIM email better?
iPhone devs are also leaving the App Store
Google is not the only one bleeding devs for their phone platform, Apple is also facing developper exodus :
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/11/1...ssively-popular-iphone-app-quits-the-project/
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2009/11/respected-developers-fleeing-from-app-store-platform.ars
Kind of disapointing Macrumors chooses to report on the competition, but not the iPhone itself. It's not like Apple is fairing any better.
Google is not the only one bleeding devs for their phone platform, Apple is also facing developper exodus :
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/11/1...ssively-popular-iphone-app-quits-the-project/
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2009/11/respected-developers-fleeing-from-app-store-platform.ars
Kind of disapointing Macrumors chooses to report on the competition, but not the iPhone itself. It's not like Apple is fairing any better.
That's no exodus. You've shown us two unhappy developers who happen to be high profile.
Like Hewitt said: For every dev that leaves iPhone in frustration, 1000 new ones join up. iPhone is an unstoppable train regardless of how much complaining there is.
It's not like Apple is faring any better?? It's actually like Apple is faring oh . . . about 100,000 times better.
Macrumours DID report on this. I would hardly call it a mass exodus.
Also, LOL!!!!!!! Apples not fairing any better than who?? Please be more specific, or notice the flaw in your statement and don't reply at all either way I'm happy
Macrumours DID report on this. I would hardly call it a mass exodus.
Also, LOL!!!!!!! Apples not fairing better any better than who?? Please be more specific, or notice the flaw in your statement and don't reply at all neither way I'm happy
Apple is faring the best of them all (by far.) iPhone is the hottest platform (and continues to be, with no end in sigtht.) Developers will get hands-down the most exposure on the iPhone. And Apple continues to make improvements to their App Store policies. That's what's so scary for everyone else. Apple is making an effort to improve on what is already wildly successful.
Alexandre de Rochefort, finance director of French game developer Gameloft:
“We are selling 400 times more games on iPhone than on Android.”
I wonder why that is . . .
Honestly this article doesn't surprise me at all. It all comes down to user base, there's what maybe a million Android phones out there compared to how many millions of iphones?
This really is one of those chicken/egg situations. You wont get a huge user base without lots of great apps, but you wont get lots of great apps without enough users to buy them.
Apple is in the exact opposite situation when it comes to pc gaming. Lots of companies don't port their games to mac because they dont see a compelling financial reason, however people wont make the switch cause their favorite apps/games aren't on mac.
As for me? I have a macbook pro laptop and love it, if i could easily/legally run OS X on my desktop pc i would. I think OS X is an amazing operating system. I also have a Motorola Droid and think it's a great phone, but if i wanted to develop an app, it would be for the iphone simply due to the bigger user base.
As of right now, there are a lot of Android based phones getting ready to hit the market shortly so in a year or two it will be worth it to develop for Android. As for now? Apple clearly is the leader in the smartphone app market.
This really is one of those chicken/egg situations. You wont get a huge user base without lots of great apps, but you wont get lots of great apps without enough users to buy them.
Apple is in the exact opposite situation when it comes to pc gaming. Lots of companies don't port their games to mac because they dont see a compelling financial reason, however people wont make the switch cause their favorite apps/games aren't on mac.
As for me? I have a macbook pro laptop and love it, if i could easily/legally run OS X on my desktop pc i would. I think OS X is an amazing operating system. I also have a Motorola Droid and think it's a great phone, but if i wanted to develop an app, it would be for the iphone simply due to the bigger user base.
As of right now, there are a lot of Android based phones getting ready to hit the market shortly so in a year or two it will be worth it to develop for Android. As for now? Apple clearly is the leader in the smartphone app market.
The iPhone once upon a time had a small userbase as well. Something has to carry your sales past that. With the iPhone, you see what that "something" is immediately. With the Droid . . . not so clear. It already doesn't measure up to the iPhone. That's already an uphill battle. The first rule is to surpass the iPhone in its key areas of strength. Droid has failed to do that. And if it doesn't measure up to the Gold Standard, it's app store starts from even further behind the starting line.
Maybe because Android, and all other competitive mobile OS's were built as a phone OS's. Not a mobile media gaming platform. Even with the iPhone no one was saying HEY this is going to be a gaming device. They all thought it would have games, but not to the extent it does today. It was after developers saw the phones success that things started really taking off.
Sure all these phones can have the same hardware to make games work, but the only thing that makes games POPULAR on the iPhone is the user base. Without it, developing games for smartphones would be a lot less appealing to these developers.
I'm sure this statement applies to almost all mobile software devs out there. Of course I rather have my app available to the iPhone's customer base over Androids. More money.
Sure all these phones can have the same hardware to make games work, but the only thing that makes games POPULAR on the iPhone is the user base. Without it, developing games for smartphones would be a lot less appealing to these developers.
I'm sure this statement applies to almost all mobile software devs out there. Of course I rather have my app available to the iPhone's customer base over Androids. More money.
Wait, this is different than 1 Android developper... how exactly ?
Gameloft is 1 dev, Apple has more (read the article from Ars I posted, they actually list a lot more than 2 developpers).
Stop fanboying and read. Apple is having as much problems as Android, as Palm as whoever. The thing is people are now realising that mobile apps aren't a goldmine on any platform. The gold rush is over for everyone.
And iPhone is still 3rd in sales share... hardly the "best of them all".
Macrumours DID report on this. I would hardly call it a mass exodus.
Also, LOL!!!!!!! Apples not fairing any better than who?? Please be more specific, or notice the flaw in your statement and don't reply at all either way I'm happy
When and where ? I just went through the front page, older articles and page 2. Slashdot reported on this, not Macrumors.
Fanboy statement enough?
What places a flickering Droid screen above the smooth clear video of iPhone?
Could it be only the fanaticism of a Dud, the nickname of a Verizon Droid fan boy.
Has anyone else seen so much flickering since the days of primitive TV?
The iPhone is simply the better device for a gamer IMO.
As an ex iPhone owner and now an Android user I can easily see the quality and variety of games on the Android platform is far worse than the iPhone.
Luckily for me, I wasn't a fan of touchscreen gaming so this is no big loss to me personally but the iPhone does have its advantages with gaming.
Off topic
To those that dismiss Android's ability to multitask as a drain on the phones battery, do we feel as harsh about the drain on the iPhone whilst playing games?
As an ex iPhone owner and now an Android user I can easily see the quality and variety of games on the Android platform is far worse than the iPhone.
Luckily for me, I wasn't a fan of touchscreen gaming so this is no big loss to me personally but the iPhone does have its advantages with gaming.
Off topic
To those that dismiss Android's ability to multitask as a drain on the phones battery, do we feel as harsh about the drain on the iPhone whilst playing games?
Is that why there is a report of the Droid price falling to $119.99 today (11-20-09) in the Dell Store?
Why the huge price cut in just a few weeks of Droid's introduction if anyone was really lining up to buy one?
Is this an act of desperation to dump unsold Droid stock before the XMAS season is over?
Do you realize it means if you bought a new Droid its value has plummeted by almost half in just three weeks? No wonder Verizon added a new $350 early termination fee for anyone who tries to flee Big Red to get an iPhone.
Or maybe they are just following the Apple playbook : https://www.macrumors.com/2007/09/05/8gb-iphone-price-drop-4gb-iphone-discontinued/
But they already have "real" competition -- tons of it. Blackberry OS, Symbian, Android, WinMo, WebOS and, coming soon, Bada. Maybe the iPhone is best phone Apple could come up with. It's better than any phone anyone else has come up with, but perhaps Apple has latent superpowers enabling them to invent technology no one else has even dreamed of, if only more people would compete with them. Poor Apple.
That's bizarre, you simply repeated LTD's point but then started calling him names. Let's review: Apple entered the market with 0% market share. Now they have less than 3% of the mobile phone market and about 17% of the smart phone market. So, from Apple's point of view, at least 83% of the market is the competition. But, according to you, there's some kind of problem with pointing that out. And it makes one "unrealistic".
Here's a list of the changes in the 3GS since you seem to have forgotten. As is often the case, Apple focused on adding features that improve real-world experience rather than bolting on useless gee-whiz crap that's new for the sake of being new. Personally, I prefer products that are well designed to begin with and don't need to be reinvented every year. In fact, one of the hallmarks of good design is that it actually remains good for more than a year or two.
By the way, what other "really cool stuff" did they kibosh?
Android will get plenty of market share, but it will be at the expense of everyone but Apple. So your wish for Apple to lose business may go unfulfilled, but other companies will lose business and at least that's something to feel good about... I guess... based on your logic.