[IGDA Mobile-SIG List] Future of mobile games

[John Bridges]

The real issue isn't necessarily that you don't want to build a game for 
all those handsets, its the prohibitive cost.

In the current market I would say that you should probably have 3 
development streams - 1 for Series 40 alike handsets, 1 for mid-range 
and 1 for high end.

The problem is the cap on sales price for the game is £5/€5 and in 
reality if you're going to build a high-end Symbian game you really want 
to charge £10 - £15. My hunch is that for Symbian content you won't 
significantly dampen your audience at that price but you will make a LOT 
more money - this is the ballpark for  alot of Blackberry content after all.

How significant is the s40 market nowadays though ? If you look at the 
UK market for example, deck sales are almost entirely driven by handsets 
1 - 2 years old.

JB

Jorge Gonzalez Sanchez wrote:

> While the Nokia S40v1 thing can be true, you can't really base your 

> designs around portability to the low-end handsets, even if they 

> represent a big slice of the market pie.

>  

> We always work around a S60v2-Razr-ish version as a base, and then 

> down(and up) scale from there.

>  

> Ever tried the Nokia 3200 version of King Kong? Its barely enough for 

> the client not to have the right to say he was ripped off. The S60 

> version comes with all sorts of bells and whistles.

>  

> Unless you get one of those tetris-godlike ideas for a game, you will 

> end up with a poor game on most handsets if you think too much on them 

> shabby handsets. Consider I say this while having all the porting done 

> in-house.

>

>  

> On 3/7/07, *William Volk* <bvolk at mynumo.com <mailto:bvolk at mynumo.com>> 

> wrote:

>

>     The reason that licenses MAKE SENSE for mobile games is because

>     the majority of mobile game sales are from carrier 'decks'.

>

>     Therefore what the consumer sees is about 20 – 40 characters of text.

>

>     So for publishers, it's worth spending $$$ to make that text stand

>     out.

>

>     One thing that is holding up game design is that a requirement of

>     getting on-deck is to support a very wide range of handsets.  If

>     you have to support a "Series-40" handset it may not be worth your

>     while to build a fancy version for a smartphone.

>

>     William Volk

>     MyNuMo

>

>

>     ------------------------------------------------------------------------

>     *From: *DrDon <don at sonaural.com <mailto:don at sonaural.com>>

>

>

>     I think part (but not all by any means) of it is that the

>     evolution of phone game design is not progressing as fast as the

>     evolution of hardware capabilities. This being due to the

>     incredibly rapid rate at which hardware capabilities increase. In

>     the past, game hardwares have been relatively stable and largely

>     driven by capabilities developers wanted. With phones, it's the

>     other way around. Definitely a unique problem.

>

>     Licensing (with the possible exception of sports games) have

>     always been a "iffy" prospect where you have to weigh the cost of

>     the license with the cost of development, and hopefully some

>     mitigation of risk when compared against original ip. Some have

>     succeeded, many have failed regardless of platform. You still have

>     to have a decent game. Presumably, the cost of a license will be

>     offset by the increased sales right? Easier said than done!

>     Especially on phones where the value of a movie or TV license

>     isn't the same as on other game platforms.

>

>     dd

>

>     Jorge Gonzalez Sanchez wrote:

>

>         Yeah, as DrDon said, mobile industry, as chaotic as it is (no

>         more than the PC), has yet to find its Command n Conquers, its

>         WoWs or whatever, a game which represents the mobile industrys

>         finest.

>          

>         Licensed games dont always sell that well. I remember reading

>         something on Gamasutra a while ago saying the LOTR mobile

>         game(s?) bombed in the face of simpler, classinc titles like

>         Tetris or Parcheese. Licenses are good. Taking inspiration

>         from classics also is, but mobile games are a kind of it own

>         (mainly because of the horrible, inconsistent human

>         interfaces), and should be treated as such.

>          

>         A couple of years ago nobody gave a dime for Touch-screen

>         games, and now the DS prints money. GPS, SMS, the microphone

>         and the Camera are great interfaces which offer great

>         possibilities, but are still pretty much unexplored.

>          

>          

>          

>          

>         On 3/7/07, *DrDon* <don at sonaural.com

>         <mailto:don at sonaural.com>> wrote:

>

>

>             IMHO - the killer-app game for mobile has yet to be made

>             (as many point out).

>              

>             dd

>              

>             � wrote:

>

>

>                 Hi all,

>

>                 I saw last year's TOP 50 games (according ELSPA) and

>                 the speech of Trip

>                 Hawkins in GDC, and I went to sleep with a question

>                 biting my head last

>                 night: Is there a future for original mobile games?

>

>

>                 As we can see, most of downloaded games are

>                 adaptations from Console/PC

>                 games or those using TV show brands. As Hawkins said,

>                 only 5% of mobile

>                 customer download a game and, coincidentally, 5% of

>                 mobile customers are

>

>                 console/PC gamers (or ex-gamers). Maybe that would

>                 explain why the most

>                 downloaded games are remakes of console/PC ones.

>

>                 We know that it is too expensive to keep getting

>                 brands to create a new

>                 game. Only big companies, like EA, Ubisoft and others,

>                 that already got

>

>                 their own big brands, do not have big costs to worry with.

>

>                 So, I would like to listen to some opinions about this.

>

>                 PS: The article can be found at:

>

>                 http://www.mobileindustry.biz/article.php?article_id=2327

>                 <http://www.mobileindustry.biz/article.php?article_id=2327>

>

>

>                 PS2: The ELSPA article can be found at:

>                 http://mobilegames.blogs.com/mobile_games_blog/2007/01/elspas_2006_lis.html

>                  

>                 <http://mobilegames.blogs.com/mobile_games_blog/2007/01/elspas_2006_lis.html>

>

>

>                 Thanks and best regards,

>

>                   

>                  

>

>

>              

>               

>             -- 

>              

>              

>

>             *Don Diekneite

>             *

>

>             *Sonaural Audio Studios

>             *

>

>             (408)799-6123

>

>

>             Hear us online: www.Sonaural.com

>             <http://www.sonaural.com/> <http://www.sonaural.com/>

>

>              

>              

>              

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>

>

>          

>          

>          

>         -- 

>         Jorge Gonzalez Sanchez

>         Blue River S.A.

>          

>         TEL. +54 (11) 4777-9431

>         MOV. +54 (911) 6167-5412

>

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>

>

>     -- 

>     Don Diekneite

>     *Don Diekneite

>     **Sonaural Audio Studios

>     *(408)799-6123

>     Hear us online: www.Sonaural.com <http://www.sonaural.com/>

>     <http://www.sonaural.com/>

>

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>

>

> -- 

> Jorge Gonzalez Sanchez

> Blue River S.A.

>

> TEL. +54 (11) 4777-9431

> MOV. +54 (911) 6167-5412

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