I read a lot of comments about Apple’s policies and how they don’t differ from consoles manufacturers policies and how we should be ok with them because we didn’t say anything since the NES.
Well, I believe that:
- Apple’s devices are not game focused devices. They’re now claiming that it always has been the case, you know, Apple’s classic rewriting of events. Their devices are mobile computers where any software can be made and sold, even stupid ones like fart apps. The software ecosystem is wild and large like the desktop computer market. Developers always have been free to do whatever they want in an environment like that (windows/linux/osx/symbian you name it). It generates innovation. So these policies are a big step back (same with Windows Phone 7).
- Consoles are more about 25 years old and they had two advantages over computers: the gamepad and the living room. For some reason gamepads only became common on computers around 2000 and they are still tied to consoles. Computers are more and more in the living room but it’s still early. So Nintendo Sega Sony Microsoft console dictatorship over developers has been ok since 85-86.
Why do we comply nowadays even with Apple who should not do that? Besides having a game specifically thought for an input you can’t find anywhere else (Wiimote, touchscreen), which is the case for a minority of games, it’s only for lousy reasons. Gamedev peeps grew up with dreams of making their own game on the obviously awesome next Nintendo console or next Sony station or because they started on their beloved old ass Apple II, they’re doing iPhone stuff. It’s a fanboy thing. It’s mostly a non-business made decision, sadly.
Never have been a fan of them…Lefty thing?
But with the explosion of budgets game developers increasingly didn’t really like to work with Nintendo/Microsoft/Sony. Dealing with expensive dev kits, verifications, approvals, delays and people having absolute power over the work of a team is unproductive. Who wants to spend thousands of dollars on hardware to develop a game for a console, with a smiling manufacturer pushing your game release for the last month of the quarter or not pushing it enough in the store because it would cannibalize their product? Months, years of hard work to witness that kind of shit? Thanks but no thanks.
Even worse, today if you are a third-party developer and want to make money –at least in the classic AAA business- you have to do it multi-platform which is basically, like making a game for computers, with different configurations… Add the dictatorship hassle. To be successful on a console today is an impossible task (look at how publishers just bleed money like crazy despite using huge marketing campaign for their games). It’s ridiculous.
Now in 2010, if you’re thinking without emotions from your childhood, the platform of choice is the classic Personal Computer, like it or not. Because you have 250 millions of these sold each year. Multi-core and hundreds of stream processors, gigs of RAM and more and more similar inter-connection and architecture (laptop to TV connection as easy as a console). Digital distribution. Link sharing and its virality via emails and boards. Because game developers can use whatever the fuck they want to build a game, can use any topic and let their minds explore ideas without fearing that it’s going to be rejected by some stupid and arbitrary organization or committee. Mind you, that’s critical to make a good game or at least, get a good start at it.
So there.