Back in November we covered Onyx Online from Steve Demeter of Demiforce, maker of Trism. Onyx Online is Steve’s attempt to bring all the gaming community goodness of the Xbox Live Arcade to the iPhone platform.
In a nutshell, Onyx Online is the XBox Live Arcade ecosystem brought to the iPhone. I wrote this kind of system into Trism as a case study, and it’s been a complete success. Since Trism launched in July, we’ve been hard at work adapting this online code for use in any iPhone game, and the results are stunning. What we’re going to do is allow any developer to insert the Onyx code into their game, which will instantly enable online scoring, achievements, leaderboards, and customized forums.
As Offworld reports, Steve’s not the only one working to bring an open community to the platform we all know and love. The makers of Aurora Feint, Danielle Cassley and Jason Citron, are throwing their hat into the iPhone social network ring. They have launched OpenFeint.
Currently available for private beta, Danielle and Jason will host the server (compatible with Google’s OpenSocial REST API) and is available through the OpenFeint Client code library and sample UI code. They are planning to keep the platform free for developers up to an unspecified “limited" number of concurrent clients. The product goes live in March.
What OpenFeint offers:
— Profiles: Players can upload any avatar photo or one from their phone’s camera
— Walls: Each player gets a wall where other players can leave comments and view wall-to-wall conversations
— Asynchronous Real-Time Chat: Game-specific chat rooms for meeting other players, sharing tips, strategies and experiences within each game community
— Friends List: Players can friend other players within their game community or across the gaming community
— Newsfeeds: Players can keep in touch with all of their friends’ activities (wall comments, actions in games, befriending people)
— Global Community Chat: Game-independent rooms for players to discuss recommendations, tips, and experiences on other games
Stay tuned for more info on both OpenFeint and Onyx Online as it surfaces. In my opinion, Apple should have set this up in the first place. Let’s hope, absent that, a third party solution can successfully bring iPhone platform gamers together in a meaningful way.
I'm still waiting for them to port Pangea Arcade.
Well... never played the Mac version (I wouldn't touch a Mac if my life depended on it) but the screenshot on iPhone looks much more vivid and crisper than the Mac video version. Amazing how huge apps can fit into iPhone.
Larrybeo, you do realize that the iPhone uses the same os as a mac?
So the 'mac you would not touch if your life depended on it' you have actually been touching every day.
If you like the iPhone much why not give the mac a go?
@larrybeo
Why let life pass you by...
Ha ha I love it when people did macs without realizing how much of modern computing is owed to them. Even the very concept of windows.
Enjoy your iPhone though. An item which encapsulates everything apple stands for.
Life's too short to use Windows, really.
I hope its not gonna be the same boring sh1t as Bugdom 2! Seems to be on the same engine but different story.
I am touching my Mac right now :D
As for this game; I think it is better suited for a desktop sized machine unless they can find a workaround for those large, hideous buttons.
Anyone else sick of mediocre Pangea ports? These games were never meant to be played on something like an iPhone, resulting in slow and awkward gameplay. Clearly just an easy cash-in for Greenstone.
Dustin: have you played this? Or the new controls in the updated Bugdom 2?
I haven't yet, but I plan to since I liked Otto Matic years ago--and I won't judge sight unseen. If these weren't "meant" for iPhone, then no 3rd-person action game is. I can't make a blanket statement against all 3rd-party games or all Pangea games. I can say that I didn't like the original controls for Bugdom 2, but they changed them.
And I can say that their Enigmo is one of the best games on iPhone. A big screen would be great, but a small screen just means I use zoom a lot.
(Wow, I had about 4 anti-spam words in a row rejected.)
Mac review:
http://mac.ign.com/articles...
@Dustin
Agreed. I wasn't too impressed with the controls of Bugdom or Nanosaur on the iPhone. Might still buy this for €0,79.
The Mac version of Otto Matic was fun, though.
Props to Brian Greenstone being about as indie as developers get while carving out a niche but is it just me, weren't the Pangea games always boring to begin with? I have respect for him as a dev supporting the Mac and finding new life on the iPhone but I dunno, my parents iMac came with Nanosaur (original 233 Mhz) about the only thing notable is the game played fairly well on the iMac which had about 2 MB of VRAM, but the gameplay in all the games always seemed to be the same. Find said items, and keys to get to the later portion of the levels. Bugdom, Ottomatic and Nanosaur might as well been the same game. I'll just leave it at that.
I completed Otto Matic on the Mac back when it came free with iBooks and such :). The controls could be annoying even on a computer interface and the screenshots here for the iPhone really do make that screen look crowded!
I was also unimpressed with the controls for Bugdom 2, and didn't persevere with it long. And I fully did not get the big deal with Enigmo - just found it frustrating after the first 5 or so levels :(.
Re touching Macs, the existence of the iPhone really owes a lot to many people touching their Macs, and I would say that more and more lives will come to depend on people touching their own (Macs) as time goes on. If recent DRM-related stories about W7 are accurate, no one will be wanting to touch that with a barge pole (of indeterminate length).
1) controls in this game can be resized and the buttons can be scaled. I still would "rather" see controls similar to Dropship. All developers need to get that game and learn how to make a floating dynamic joystick. its not that hard... really.. noone wants to be forced to attempt to touch a 8 way fake joystick on the screen. we want to touch a virtual invisible joystick that automatically centers under your finger and scales with the size you drag from the center.
2) about windows 7. good luck. have you run the beta? no? i have. its windows vista. + windows XP, but its like 80% vista and 20% xp. if you LOVE vista, you will love windows 7. if you love XP, you will want to gouge your eyes out and just install windowblinds for XP and booya! windows 7 looks without the vista feel.
3) if you haven't used a mac then you are like the dork in highschool who still plays with "insert out of style item here". yah.. it was cool to not like macs back in 1995 but its 2009 now and your doing yourself a social injustice by being the left over dork who still doesn't use a mac. times have changed.. come join the cool train with all the cool kids.. its ok.. we have space for you.
definitely brings back memories of buying a new ibook
what I really want is an iPhone port of the other free game that came with the laptop - the paper airplane game. I googles it the other day but can't remember the name. either way, I loved that game & music. the controls would feel perfect on iPhone as well. I check the appstore all the time for it :5 the other paper airplane games don't come close, unfortunately
on my old mac i had found && downloaded the full version of Otto-Matic for free, but i sold my laptop to my niece. I have a new mac now, but now i can't find the sites that had it 2 months ago. Can anyone help?