Mobile games designed for TV

Why are we waiting for the Wii U to come out when we already have it? It’s called AirPlay.

The latest versions of Apple’s iOS supports a technology that allows you to display your mobile screen on the TV. Hooray! That means PowerPoints for everybody! Not exciting you? How about games, then?

The comparison between AirPlay and Wii U may have been a bit of a stretch, but the technology still presents an interesting opportunity for game developers. Anyone who has an Apple TV can share their iPad’s display over WiFi to be displayed on the TV. For games, AirPlay can take it one step further and allow you to display something different over the TV than what’s being shown on the iPad screen. In practice, this means you can control your character on the TV while having your dashboard controls on the iPad, touch screen and accelerometer included.

Who could forget this little gadget?

The concept of a TV game being controlled by mobile devices isn’t new. We’ve been able to do this in the past with the Game Boy Advance Link Cable (remember "The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures" or "Pokémon Colosseum"). Downfalls included a limited title selection, still having to have a dedicated console and being limited by the Game Boy Advance controls. Today’s technology combination with accelerometer sensors, wireless multiplayer and high-resolution displays have created the perfect storm that could really let this idea grow.

Multiplayer is where AirPlay could really shine.

Being able to have four or so iPhones connect to an iPad, having the iPad project something on the screen and having the individual controls be on their respective devices could lead to some pretty innovative games. Anyone who has played the Wii U can instantly make the connection between what AirPlay games could be and the direction that Nintendo is going with their games.

Testing out the games currently available in the market shows huge room for improvement. Many of them suffer from lag issues, general bugs (why is my place flickering!?) and don’t truly take advantage of all the different gameplay methods AirPlay allows for.

Higher performance games create some issues too. The iPad does have the ability to render some pretty great looking 3D graphics, but adding AirPlay to the mix adds a lot more work for the processor. It needs to render the game’s graphics, then compress the image and send it over WiFi to your router and then your Apple TV in real time. This means that right now, expansive worlds with elaborate 3D graphics may not be the target game for this platform.

Apple’s devices aren’t the only place where this is happening, either. Ouya is an Android based game console that’s currently in development, and while it takes a different approach to gaming by building the actual system in to the device connected to the TV (where as the Apple TV only acts as a dumb box to display what the iPad is feeding it), it could very easily integrate Android-powered controllers and take advantage of the same multiplayer, accelerometer and touch-screen goodness.

One of the great things about the expansion of mobile devices as a viable gaming platform is that the barrier to entry is so small that pretty much anyone can just start making something. The problem before was that your creation was just stuck on an individual device with a 3” screen. AirPlay and other implementations of it really allow anyone to develop games designed for TV just like the bigger consoles.

Tablets. Who knew?

Are tablets the future?

It seems in the past few years, that mobile devices with touch screens have been on the rise. From Android devices to the iPhone, everyone nowadays has one, and, because of that, mobile gaming has become more prominent.

But bigger is always better, so tablets were made. Okay, so maybe the tablets weren't specifically made for the mobile gaming group, but they did have them in mind. So much in mind that at this year's E3, tablets and mobile devices had a big presence on the show floor.

Companies like Gree held a huge part of the floor showing off their new games and applications for various devices including "Farmville"-esque building games and “Resident Evil: The Mercenaries VS,” some of which are exclusive to the larger tablets. With what’s already on the iTunes App store, tablets are slowly starting to take over mobile gaming as a whole.

Mobile-game developer Gree at E3 2012.

The tablet’s success can be drawn up like this:

Mobile gaming previously involved just having a Gameboy in your pocket and being able to pull it out whenever. Now, convenience has become a bigger issue.

Why have a brick of a Nintendo 3DS in your pocket, only meant for playing games, when you can have a thinner iPhone which can be used for practically everything? You can be sitting at home working on something on your tablet and with just a few taps of your fingers you can be playing "Tetris."

It’s a big thing to be able to do that when in the past you'd have to change a disc or cartridge.

Consumers aren’t the only ones who've noticed this. Big name gaming companies have too.

The PS Vita could help bridge the gap from tablet to handheld.

It can be argued that Nintendo was the first to start the touch era, but it’s pretty safe to assume that their new console, the Wii U, has been at least ever so slightly influenced by the tablet craze. I mean the controller is basically a tablet with thumbsticks and buttons, and, to tell you the truth, it actually works. But for more on that, go check out Mike’sopinion of the Wii U.

Sony is also taking part in this trend. With the PS Vita having the dual touch-screens and all the similar capabilities of a tablet, it’s not a far cry to say that this handheld was made to appeal to both tablet users and handheld gamers. Like I said earlier, it’s all about convenience.

With these options, people who are on the fence about either getting a tablet or a gaming device can now have both in one, and this is what the companies are aiming for. To bring the core gamers and the casual gamers to one device that everyone can enjoy.

Now the question whether tablets are the future of the gaming industry or just a fad. My personal opinion is that maybe it’s here to stay. Most people already have a tablet device that they can play games on. It's unlikely that people will want to shell out another $200 for a Nintendo DS when they already can play a touch screen game on their phone. That’s why so many companies are coming up with more mobile games and platforms that seem similar to the tablet.

There is a difference, though, if you play on a tablet and a handheld system. Most people who play on a tablet only intend to play for 5 minutes or so as a way to kill time. A handheld is meant to be an activity, spending hours and hours playing, but this could all change soon enough with the growth of the PS Vita and Wii U.