For example, the GBA had plenty of RPGs and fleshed out games that lasted hours and hours. I know there is a way to play GBA games on the iPhone but I've found it to be awkward, with controls that aren't optimized for the platform. Why aren't more RPGs (like Zenonia) being released?
Cause it takes quite a bit of thought and time to make one, unless it's ported but stil...and plus, most idevice users are really not looking for long story-driven games like that. Ah...I wish there were more too
because developers in the app store won't bringgames that are either big, cool and innovative (BIA) but rather small pick up and play games (flight control) because that is what peopele want. Cheep fast games. RPGs are very hard to make and require lots of invested time, especially story driven games. It is easier for devs to make smaller games and that is what iphone owners want. Correct me if I am wrong, but zenonia hasn't made its way to the top ten yet, while flight control maintained 1st for a matter of weeks.
Cause that's a lot of time and resources for a dev to put into something that might not sell at all. The "$0.99 mentality" has bred a gaming ecosystem that caters to the tower-defense-knockoffs and imob-knockoffs and such. just my opinion of course.
Spot on, with the race to 99¢, developers just can't afford to spend the time it takes to make an epic RPG. The only reason we got Zenonia is because it already existed on mobile phones and it just got ported. If you look at games like the SNES or GBA classic RPG's that would work wonderfully on the iPhone, they all were created with a staff of developers, artists, and writers that rival a small movie production. It's just not realistic to finance a project like that when you're forced to sell it for 99¢. The 3GS is fully capable of emulating Final Fantasy 7, imagine what both the 3G and the 3GS would be capable of without emulation if a big-name studio sunk the kind of money that goes in to your average Final Fantasy title in to an iPhone game. It would be unbelievable.
they should just import games that has dried up from classic systems but how much money can they actually make?
ya why can't they just port some SNES or even NES games? is nintendo blocking them to protect dsi sales? i wanna see chrono trigger, secret of mana/evermore, final fantasy 1-infinity, earthbound, donkey kong country, mario world you know, classics ... to answer my own question i googled it and found this http://www.touchpodium.com/2008/08/28/nintendo-not-brining-any-games-to-the-app-store/
I tried playing Chrono Trigger on the iPhone via an emulator (I own it so it's not illegal) but it was just awkward and unstable. A proper port would be great, I'd love to see some of the clasic 16bit RPGs ported over. I'd pay $5-$10 easily.
Once again as people have said, it's pretty much the time,effort and scale of those kind of games. In another thread I created I was talking/thinking about a turn based strategy RPG. I'm still not fully convinced how far I'll go with it simply based on the market for it. If I do go ahead (I've already started making the battlefield and pathfinder) I might release just the battle mode of the game first, like pick your units and fight, kinda like...warhammer/star control(Best Game Ever) where you choose the point/value of your army and then select units and fight. If people enjoy that and what not, I'll continue with a single player story. But that's the way I'm planning to approach this genre since it's lacking variety.
Because Most Devs think of the iPhone as a way to get a quick buck in their pocket by making crappy, vaporware.
Because that's all people are willing to buy. Look at the comments of almost any game we post about on the front page that costs more than a dollar.
Yes, that's because the iPhone is marketed as a Device for quick, casual games. That's what people think when they go to buy their iPhone as well. Look at Apple's advertisements. People see the adverts demonstrating hundreds of games and they believe that they are, quick and casual games. If Apple made individual game adverts, they might have a slight change in their perspective. EDITED
http://www.apple.com/ipodtouch/gallery/ads/large.html It was aired during the TV show "24". I especially like the last game.
Here's a follow-up question. Does the iphone gaming crowd actually WANT more massive story-driven RPGs. I know WE do, but we're a little more hard-core than the average idevice gamer. Yes Zenonia did very well... but how many people are really looking to sit down for an hour or two every other night to play an RPG on their phone when they could easily play big RPG's on their PC. The iDevice is a travel gaming system and therefore an inherently "arcade" gaming system. Is there a true audience for massive story-based games? What about online RPG's like WOW? Hard to say.
It's a convergence device, so if developers were able to give people reason to stop carrying around their PSP's or DS's I think it would catch on. Again, the problem is that you will never see anything that compares unless games are comfortably selling between $10-20. iPhone games are developed with a razor thin budget on extremely accelerated development cycles compared to anything on a console. If the rumored "premium" App Store ever took off, I bet we would start seeing games that compare.
The reason why there arent many story driven games are the fact that the Ipod Touch/Iphone has yet to be realized as a HANDHELD gaming machine which it has all the potential to be. It has yet to be recognized but almost all devs and the majority of its own community. Some of you say well who goes how and sits and plays their idevice for 2 hours well thats like asking who goes home and plays a DS for 2 hours, lots of people do and lots of people would for the Idevice as well if there were story driven games and deep long games to give them something to play in those 2 hours. Vay would be a perfect example of what could be done with rpgs on the system if it had a virtual d pad to walk with the option to tap to move, I believe the only reason it is not well known is because of its weird design and story(i like the game). Once some one puts the time to put forth real games on the device I think it could sky rocket. Id has the right idea they are the first studio I have seen put true effort into the device while most of the games they are bringing are ports, they are full fledged games with hours of play and a team that actually spends time in putting the effort into finding controls that work well with the game at hand. Also the app stop needs to be PURGED of all the stupid apps that do nothing and the 5 million sudoku games. You can buy like 5 books of sudoku for like a buck so why should there be 5 million copies on the app store with different colored back grounds that sell for 99 cents or more. I think that if you are going to make something like sudoku which is not worth 99 cents bundle it with some other games like crossword, sudoku, hangman, tic tac toe, and a bunch of other crap so you actually get your moneys worth. The reason that all the useless and repetitive apps need removed is because when a "real" game is released it is one among thousands of crappy games so it is over looked by the majority of people who do not fling them selves at website like touch arcade to find out when new games are coming. the last big problem is that no one is willing to pay for anything. A quality game comes out like for example the Sims 3 that would easily sell the exact same copy on DS or PSP for 30 or 40 dollars is released for 10 bucks and in the forum thread the first thing i see is "whens a price drop", "why isnt it 99 cents", "im not gettign it unless its free". Quality of product comes with a high price so when basically you get what you pay for. I personally believe that games shouldnt get 'sales" or price drops for at least a year or not at all. It would help to show that games can still sell at 10 dollars and the such. That being a door to to devs who make full games to say if i make something for this market they will actually pay me for it and reward the effort we put into our games. I personally have no problem paying 10-30 dollars for what another handheld gaming community would call a "real" game. ^ All just my 99 cents lol
