Ah, that does make sense! I guess if I owned an iPad 2 it wouldn't make any sense for me to upgrade because I'm an avid book collector. I tried to get into the ebook fad, but I have to have a physical copy. plus there's nothing like going to the bookstore, getting a new book, and adding it to your collection. I plan on getting the Game of Thrones series because I love the show. I'll prolly never read them because the show stays true to the books, but they'll look damn good on my shelf. Yeah, the crashing and quality issues have really gotten out of hand.
I don't get why people bother being so outspoken about their dislike of freemium. Technically, I'm not a huge fan either, but it's not worth mentioning because I also own a few utterly fantastic freemium games. Bearing that in mind, it's not the business model I have a problem with, just it's usual implementation. When a new developer decides to take that route it's up to them to do it properly, but there's still a chance they can get it right. The more apps we get with the successful freemium formula in place, the more developers will take note and follow, hopefully improving on the model as a whole and making everybody happy. It's not something to be discouraged, just carefully nurtured.
Sounds slightly backward to me. Can you read text on a PC? If you're worried about "jaggy text" you're gonna get the same problem on pretty much every screen on the planet that isn't retina. iPad text is practically no different to those. Graphics on the other hand, would have double the resolution, a massive difference.
Well, I've only played a few games on iPad, but from the general consensus, they look great. If iPad 2 to 3 is like 720p to 1080p on tvs, it's not worth the extra $500+. However, dclose's comment for books makes sense because the new fad is ebooks, so people will want crisper text. They'll get there worth once they buy $500 dollars worth of books, but who really wins when you spend a thousand dollars to read 50 $10 books? I'm pretty sure Simian will have some more insight on the retina display and graphics when he comes back online. He obviusly doesn't think the performane will be all that better, if any, but I want to hear his opinion. The easiest assumption to make is that graphics will look sharper, but will the look $500+ worth? I don't have an iPad so I'm really curious about the iPad 3, and I have a lot of questions.
Personally, I never wanted an iPad. However, I'm getting a 1st gen for free next month, and I'm not stupid enough to turn it down... so I'll probably enjoy that but upgrading isn't on my mind at all. All retina is going to do is make non-retina games look worse, and that annoys me enough on the iPhone without bringing the iPad into it as well.
That might not be true, for example Physynth is designed with 2048x2048 textures throughout, and is designed to scale to whatever max resolution the device currently capable of. This might need a patch, because I don't know if my code is flexible enough, but I've future proofed it. It's pretty crap on iPad1 due to ram restrictions, but iPad2 onwards it should be future proofed. Now if a developer tells you that there is *any* justification for charging more for retina or high resolution, link him to this topic so I can tear him a new one. Most developers with even a TINY amount of brain power will make their source art assets a lot larger than needed. If they don't, then it's either their first game, or they're stupid and don't deserve public support. Charging more for retina in the year 2012? don't make me laugh. It's like buying a PC game and having to pay extra because you decided to upgrade your monitor.
That's how I feel. If I was to get one offered to me for free or at a heavily discounted rate, I wouldn't pass it up. In your opinion, how much better do you think the iPad 3 will look over the iPad 2? Will it be like comparing 720p and 1080p TVs?
I think you'll see the difference between iphone 3GS and 4 Or like you said, the TV. I honestly can't say about performance. Because the biggest issue we are seeing right now on mobile is fill rate, because with fill rate (how many pixels you can draw) you need heat and you need power. You can't be be elegant about it with tricks in the hardware or custom hardware, because there is a pixel on screen, and it needs drawing. At higher resolutions, that is more pixels and more juice required. That's more heat and power. I think Retina 2048x1536 would probably end up being the same performance as iPad2 + 1024x768 in terms of pixel throughput, but you would get a lot faster shader performance, vert performance and so on. As for games well it's like having a new tv for the most part. I'll take full advantage of that thing though for sure. Because it's a matter of pride, even if my game is shit, I want it to look really, really good
Thanks for the detailed response! Yeah, I can't wait to see what the next gen devices have to offer. I just hate that we are being required/will be required to upgrade every 1-2 years, nut I guess that's what iOS gamers signed up for, huh?
I happen to think that within a year, mobiles will be past xbox 360 performance and the new console is plugging an iOS device into your TV or just using your apple TV box and playing. Now if that's going to happen we want to see robust support for proper controllers like the 360 joypads or something! Cos lets face it, its very expensive for a new console launch, but mobiles get updated twice a year... and in the case of androids, probably the same since it's the underlying hardware that's important.
Well, you have more knowledge on the subject matter than me, so I can't really disagree. I did read somewhere that Uncharted 4 couldn't be made for PS3 and they're waiting to put it on PS4. I wasn't even sure if iOS was at current console level. Especially when you compare the specs side by side, but I don't really know all the stuff in detail. As long as iOS becomes somewhat dedicated and I don't have to spend $300 a year to play new games, I kinda like the idea. However, Apple is weird and very cult like in marketing,so I bet it would be Android to make this next big step.
Have to look beyond typical polygon throughput counts: 1. the mobile devices have vastly smaller screens, so you will need a lot less texture ram, a lot less throughput, less fill rate and lower polygons look good. Why do lower polys look good? well its literally down to measuring the distance between different triangle faces. Take a sphere, because the sphere is so small on device, you don't need many triangles to resemble a curve. 2. the lower resolution display means much higher shader performance relative to "filling the screen with shader pixels" - that is on xbox or ps3 you're looking at 1080p, which is a ridiculous amount of pixels to process with shaders. On iPad that is just 1024x768. 3. The PVR hardware is a tile deferred renderer - based on the desktop kyro series - this means the screen is divided up into little tiles - usually 16x16 chunks but this can change. Every opaque brick of pixels (and polys if they fit) behind which isn't seen, isn't rendered. By contrast all consoles do render pixels behind unless culled by occlusion culling. But tile deferred rendering is still much higher resolution culling than any culling system in use by consoles today. When you take that into consideration the gap between console and mobile narrows really fast. The overall "visual impression" when viewing a properly done mobile game and a console game would be remarkably similar. So what stops EA or me, or anyone else making AAA experiences on mobiles? well that is a very easy question to answer: it is extremely expensive to produce triple - A content Also the bigger the company, the more expensive it is to actually publish to mobile. They've got to go through quality controls, it costs money for decisions, there's risk and there is also massive piracy on mobile (piracy matters big time when its an AAA title because the pirate pretty much will buy an AAA title if can't pirate it ) Therefore it doesn't make sense to push the boat out. My business plan is simple: Physynth was a commercial failure but (on ipad2) extremely good looking using console / desktop shaders wherever possible. But it has not broken even. So our next few games will be good-looking but quite simplistic, and I hope people who like our games will understand we are going to try and raise our budgets with a few simple titles first. Those will give us the money we need to hire a second artist so we can get back to doing what we really want (and what you guys really want - console quality gaming). Right now it's not about can the device manage it, but more... can the developer afford to do it?
@Simian Squared Awesome answer. It definitely helped me out a lot with understanding some things. I wish more of the TA community would read this thread. I mean we're getting the answers straight from the horse's mouth. When I talk about iOS developmen, I'm pretty sure most people just blow me off. My one and only true concern with mobile gaming is I don't think I would be able to afford to game on iOS anymore. Edit But I guess even if this did happen, most devs wouldn't go this route. Also, what happens to the quality of a game once it's put on the TV. I don't have airplay, so I don't know.
I'd pay $20-30 for an AAA game on iOS. That's pretty much the same cost as an XBLA/PSN game (and they're still not as deep, complicated or high budget as retail console releases), I just don't think it's going to happen, at least not yet. To be honest though, I don't really need AAA games on iOS, I own enough consoles to cover that area of gaming, so iOS can do whatever it wants. That said, if a fantastic game were to appear, I'd have no problem buying it. It makes no difference which platform it's on provided it works; a great game is a great game and as a gamer I'll hunt it down and play the life out of it. Indie games wouldn't disappear either, there are always going to be more people who can't afford to make AAA titles than those who can, so any platform with as low an entry margin as iOS is always going to be flooded with their work. But as I said, iOS doesn't really need big titles, it's doing pretty well as it is and besides, the PS Vita is promising to cover console quality mobile gaming. It might even succeed. What I'd really hate to see though... is physical controllers being used for iPhone games. I've already got consoles like that, there's nothing new to add. The reason I own my iPod is because the touch screen forces new and innovative gaming mechanics, so if you're going back to boring old buttons it won't be too long before I've lost interest.
I've been saying I don't really want to see console games come over either. I like ports like The Bard's Tale that get redone for iOS and fit in perfectly. As of now, I'm not a fan of traditional fighting ports, most full sports games, and FPS on iOS. I wouldn't mind having an additional attachment controller for certain games though. I hate the design of the iCP and the iCade is for iPad. It would be foolish IMO to buy a game that costs $30 on iOS IMHO--that's why I won't do it. I too am an avid gamer and have never complained about prices, but that's where I draw the line.
The way I see it is the value of a game has nothing to do with the platform. If you make a great game and it's worth $30 of someone's money it could be on PC, Xbox, iOS or made out of paper and sold in toy stores, it still holds the same value.
Then I guess this is where our opinions differ, which is fine. I'd much rather pay that price on a different platform and not this one.
I am actually excited by the prospect of the combination of touch controls with standard analog inputs - as witnessed by the Wii U controller. I wish the iControlPad was more widely accepted and used - it would allow for the combination of traditional controls as well as the innovations of touch. I mean if you were able to use analog sticks and physical buttons in say GTA: CTW in addition to using the touch screen for hot-wiring cars, throwing grenades, etc. that game would feel 100 times more comfortable. ----------- In regards to price - the tech is catching up and pretty soon there will be nothing stopping an iDevice from being able to compete with modern consoles. At this point if premium commercial games start making their way to the system I would pay premium prices within reason - I still think $20-$30 is the max a digital download should cost.
