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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Will the iPhone kill traditional handhelds?

Xoj on 08 February 2010
arsenicazure said:
If they launch a sortof frame add game pad on for the iphone.. YES.

The iphone is atleast as powerful as the DC was..kinda.. so it has enough power. the screen is great too. Its not as gr8 as the zune or some other OLED's out there, but its an 8/10 easily.

So its a cool, device-decent-ish battery life, good screen, powerful hardware and it has a gr8 digital distribution backbone model..

Now all they need to do is launch it either with buttons( which they wont) or an add-on gamepad.

If Apple were to do that.

Then gamers would "jump in" :) until then.. its not a serious threat to SONY or ninty.

As for the Ipad, its gonna sell bucketloads probably but would be the worst thing that happened- especially to e-readers. Welcome to the world of extreme eyestain,dark circles, poor battery life and overpriced books.

if that happens i believe apple can make a toilet called iToilet snap a lcd 4', and sell it 500$ and people would buy it.

 



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Zlejedi on 08 February 2010
iLLmaticV3 said:
I do not think the iPhone will take over traditional handhelds ever, unless it suddenly adds buttons, better graphics, gets better developer support, and a bunch of other things. I'm pretty sure new Handhelds will be announced sometime this year also.

Actually graphics are better on iphone than at current handhelds (iirc it's estimated to have dreamcast power)

But yeah they would need to add buttons to have a chance of stealing some sales from traditional handhelds.



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burgerstein on 08 February 2010

No, for a number of reasons.

1. No Pokemon. As long as there is Pokemon, millions of Nintendo handhelds will be sold.

2. No buttons. Virtual buttons don't work. You can't feel where the button is. I haven't played many iPhone games, but I've played a lot of SM64DS, and that game has an option to use the touch screen for movement. It's just about impossible to control without hours of practice.

3. Price. iPhones are expensive. They could be selling DSs for 90 bucks if they had to. Apple will never sell anything that isn't way overpriced, it's a huge part of their business model.

4. Nintendo/Sony can do DD too. PSPgo is an all download machine, and we've got DSiWare now. And when new handhelds are released you can bet they'll be backward compatible, at least for DD.

5. Steam hasn't impacted consoles. At least not directly.



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dark_gh0st_b0y on 08 February 2010

i phone is too expensive, and no buttons is not good

on screen buttons do not work as good as real buttons, so no...



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Kenoid on 08 February 2010

The iphone games are only small types of games. It won't dominate even of popularity. Because games for handhled devices are for gaming for a limited tme only. (Only referring to the iphone)



                                  

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freebs2 on 08 February 2010

I don't think it will happen, at least soon, for many reasons.

-A large part of handleds users are kids and teens, the iphone is too expansive for most of them.

-Most gamers won't renounce playing  traditional handled games, because iphone apps are just considered as cheap pastimes by them, just like casual games succes doesn't stop gamers from playing traditional homeconsole games

-I also think that both Nintendo and Sony will come up in time with some new competitive ideas to prevent this from happening, Nintendo for example is already considering new 3G connection services on DS's successor.

Not to mention that the iphone hasn't got buttons...

 



Strategyking92 on 08 February 2010

More like I ignored the majority of your post because they are subjective opinions. Sorry to break it to you, but those just don't cut it. Sure, the iPhone OS will not have many food fighting games, and other games that support the control style. But deva just have to work around that niche genre. Some genres will and some don't, just like the other portables.

And console DD services still have no place in this arguement. Seriously, I don't remember Sony and nintendo releasing their bite sized game services well until after iPhone launched.

.And..... Wait a sec..... Last I checked both the psp and ds didn't have many good fps's.... And the ds had very few fighting games... Does that mean they suck as a game device? No.
Like I said before, I'm not even saying the device is perfect for anything. The no buttons thing really does hurt. Like I said though, when people already have the device in their pockets as a phone or multimedia device, it's not so hard to see traditional portables threatened. Convienience. Convienience.

Obviously other companies are seeing the potential, or else we wouldn't have these little iPhone bash fests everytime a thread like this comes out. In the end, the normal consumer might care if his favorite type of game doesn't work as well as he'd hope, but it's not like all of those people will go buy another portable device solely devoted to games.
Portables aren't going anywhere though. But make no mistake, some people will choose iPhone as a source of gaming.



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dobby985 on 08 February 2010

I don't think so. I never use my iPhone for gaming.



theRepublic on 08 February 2010

Until they get the price way, way down, it is not a threat. It looks like it could be a potential disruptor, but it is missing that crucial mass market price. Add the phone contract and data plan, and you realize this chops off most of the kid and teenager market. The other problem is that this device is first and foremost a phone. Always will be. That can't be changed. At most, people will find one or two good time wasters, and be done with it.



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The Anarchyz on 08 February 2010

iPhones lack of some things that the handhelds have:

1. Controls: The touchscreen is good for some things, but not for all things, that's why the DS has traditional buttons, i think if Ninty or Sony go the phone way, that phone will be like some of the Droids or the Nokia N97/N900: Touchscreen with trad. buttons

2. Physical Media: Digital Distro works like a charm with handhelds, but physical media is still favorite among handhelds, but let's say handhelds go full-digital, where they're gonna put the games when the handhelds run out of memory?, erase them and re-download them? using the USB a lot? i don't think so, SD or MS are really convenient, the iPhone doesn't have a physical media jack, the handhelds do have it and will have it...

3. BIG 1st party: Nintendo will always have Mario & Pokemon, those 2 alone move handhelds like crack, now add Nintendogs, Zelda, Kirby, etc. Sony has a lot of 1st party also (moves less handhelds but does the job) and both have big 3rd party support...