Lots of people seem to think its easy to crank out AAA games, and that all Apple needs to do is throw money at it. I like their strategy of interesting indie-style titles. Throw money at Lucas Pope instead, and get some good games.
Every console launches with at least one AAA game, some launch with 3. Apple doesn't even have a AA game.
The article mentioned Grindstone, which I just started playing recently. It is a very high quality puzzler that I have already invested many hours in. I have zero doubt that if Apple Arcade didn’t exist Grindstone would have been released with micro transactions galore, timed levels, buying “gems” etc. Which means I wouldn’t have gotten to play it because I very rarely will play games with micro transactions beyond cosmetics. So, yes, I’m a fan of Apple’s model. That said, the ratio of low-quality indie titles to high-quality titles like Grindstone and Where Cards Fall is too high on the low-quality side. It’s a young service and I hope it continues to improve, and I will certainly give it time to do so given the low cost of the service.
macplusplus said: Your post is informative in that you actually report how less-than-engaging the current top Arcade games. That is exactly what Apple is trying to resolve. A barely engaging game should keep you busy at least a hundred hours.
The average console game doesn't provide 100 hours of gameplay. Not even close. 15-25 hours would be typical for the vast majority of single player story modes. Hundreds of hours would be largely limited to online multiplayer or large scale open world games that require 4-5 years of development.
If you consume a game in 25 hours by playing in "recruit" level while the game offers four difficulty levels up to "veteran", well, that may fit into the current Arcade model where it is easy to consume games one after another in a breath. That would last only one month. Then the subscription would drop, since nothing would be left to consume further there. I don't think Apple is in the search of such a model because it already exists. Games must have depth first to engage people.
There’s only so many touch based games that are enjoyable before you realize there’s only so much you can do tapping and sliding a screen that gets hotter and hotter the more you play it.
Third party controllers are a nice addition, but nothing beats a PS4/XB1/Keyboard and Mouse for more advanced games that are native to the system you’re playing on. Advances have been made so porting between console and PC are easier than ever before, but even then there can be gameplay issues when the controls are not taken into consideration. Porting to Mobile? Look at the terrible Slay the Spire port to realize that even in this day and age developers can still screw it up.
There can only be so many Match-Three gem games, Clash of Clans, and whatever else. Apple needs better controllers if they want better games. If they don’t care about better games, then they’ll stay on the same tier they have always played on.
This is my point exactly. There's nothing wrong with played-out game concepts but why should we subscribe if it's all it offers?
Apple Arcade was a breath of fresh air. My son loves his iPad and as a treat he gets to play anything he likes, after being good and doing his reading etc
All those reasonable games with crazy costs for coins and video plays as adverts were a nightmare. Apple Arcade removes all that shit for a reasonable cost. He does not care AAA multiplayer games he wants to enjoy and hopefully learn puzzle solving and hand eye skills. My days a game was loaded and you play it no extra costs.
Maybe Apple has all the stats which will help the develop the platform for the better. Giving it a chance is worth waiting for. To me it’s more value than AppleTv+ which I’m sure they spent a lot more on.
That's great your child enjoys it. Some of us don't have kids and your child will someday grow up too. If Arcade doesn't change don't be surprised he asks for a "game console" when he gets a little older.
Why is Apple so against FPS games for example? I just want more variety than quick bite-sized games.
Apple Arcade was a breath of fresh air. My son loves his iPad and as a treat he gets to play anything he likes, after being good and doing his reading etc
All those reasonable games with crazy costs for coins and video plays as adverts were a nightmare. Apple Arcade removes all that shit for a reasonable cost. He does not care AAA multiplayer games he wants to enjoy and hopefully learn puzzle solving and hand eye skills. My days a game was loaded and you play it no extra costs.
Maybe Apple has all the stats which will help the develop the platform for the better. Giving it a chance is worth waiting for. To me it’s more value than AppleTv+ which I’m sure they spent a lot more on.
Agreed, great for kids who actually have parents. That’s a limited market though.
I love the idea of Apple getting serious about gaming.
Personally, I do All of my work on my Macs.
But when I want to enjoy some game time, I go to the PS4 and Xbox One.
Why? Because I enjoy the graphical fidelity and the control. There are some epic experiences and some games are flat out amazing.
But I haven’t seen anything approaching that level in Apple Arcade.
There are mobile games, which suck. Then there is Apple Arcade, which is like “Mobile Plus.”
But nothing that rivals a proper console AAA game or PC AAA game.
Basically with this move, Apple defeated the whole purpose of Apple Arcade.
People who want mobile games want to pay next to nothing.
People who want serious epic gaming experiences are willing to pay for it.
Apple needs to decide what they want to do. Then be the best at it.
If they just want mobile games, then just do that.
But if they are going to get into serious gaming, then go all in. Make it great. Better than consoles and PC games.
So far they haven’t made a real effort. Just slapped a subscription to a curated catalog of games they already sell.
Lame.
Would love to see them enter into some exclusive gaming contracts with AAA developers for a killer app or two and go the e tea mile to entice poets of other AAA games to the Mac/iPad/iPhone platforms - especially as they move to Apple Silicon.
Yes it will take significant investment. Yes it will be a risk. But it would pay off. One of the main knocks on the Mac is that it sucks for gaming.
And I wish that wasn’t true.
Now imagine if Apple bought Epic Games and their Unreal Engine, and made it so any game being made for any platform could be easily recompiled for Apple Silicon.
They can still license to other makers on other platforms, but they’d have he best engine and and East in to New major AAA games right away.
They need to do apple things in this space. Aggressive and refined things. Or don’t do it at all.
Apple isn’t making the games on Apple Arcade. These are the games the companies wanted to make. These are the games the games that companies wanted to try some new ideas. Apple gave money to these games to try something.
Our family loved Apple Arcade. For us it was nice to not have all the ads or purchases. There is more than hard core gamers out there. Apple Arcade may not be what you are looking at but there is many people who Apple Arcade is a good match. You can bet Apple Arcade games will work on the new ARM Macs.
Beats said: We know Apple devices are capable of Switch-like titles. We're disappointed that we have zero experiences like that.
Apple TV is capable of running 4K HDR. Imagine these visuals but better and in 4K Dolby Vision:
That's running on an old ARM chip.
I'm not a graphics whore but it's infuriating seeing all that Apple power go to waste. With the A14 chip coming in months, new Macs and hopefully a new Apple TV. I want to see Apple do something great.
Dunno...if you don't consider Oceanhorn 2 graphics to be on par with Switch, then I don't know what to tell you. The dynamic lighting and particle effects in that game were certainly higher quality than what's being shown in that Ethan Carter clip.
I cancelled my subscription just this week due to lack of new decent games. There are some excellent titles on AA, but much like the rest of the App Store there are plenty of fairly average generic games, many sidescrollers or erstwhile free games that exist in essentially the same form elsewhere on the App Store. The quality nor quantity is enough to keep me paying. I'll probably re-sub in a few months if several decent new games are published, play them, then unsubscribe again.
That said, there are a few really good games on Apple Arcade: Sneaky Sasquatch is quite fun, What The Golf is great, Beyond Steel Sky is excellent (if you can cope with the endless bugs and crashing). Oh and Spyder is good too. However, the quantity of quality games isn't enough for me. Not one of the games showcase the iPhone's graphical prowess either, most are silly casual games with typical "phone game" graphics and little replay value. I'm very unimpressed by the graphics on the AA games, which is a shame because the hardware is really powerful and some of the non-AA games look really incredible. Presumably Apple isn't paying devs enough to have the top tier artists and modellers.
Another issue seems to be lack of new content for existing games. Only one game I've played on AA (Sneaky Sasquatch) has had a content update in the last 6 months. Dunno if Apple just stops paying the devs for anything but bug fixes when the game is released or what, but lack of new content certainly doesn't help engagement.
As others have said, Apple needs either to buy a game studio or pay for a big exclusive. I've been playing The Rise of the Tomb Raider again lately through Steam, and it's just a totally different class of game to anything on Apple Arcade. From the story to the physics, the animations, sound, music and graphics. Everything is several orders of magnitude better than anything on AA. If Apple stops treating gaming on their devices as a bit of a hobby, they may end up being serious competition to consoles.
There’s only so many touch based games that are enjoyable before you realize there’s only so much you can do tapping and sliding a screen that gets hotter and hotter the more you play it.
Third party controllers are a nice addition, but nothing beats a PS4/XB1/Keyboard and Mouse for more advanced games that are native to the system you’re playing on. Advances have been made so porting between console and PC are easier than ever before, but even then there can be gameplay issues when the controls are not taken into consideration. Porting to Mobile? Look at the terrible Slay the Spire port to realize that even in this day and age developers can still screw it up.
There can only be so many Match-Three gem games, Clash of Clans, and whatever else. Apple needs better controllers if they want better games. If they don’t care about better games, then they’ll stay on the same tier they have always played on.
Apple requires devs on AA to support all input types on AppleTV, iOS and macOS. This can be pretty restrictive. There are some non-AA AppleTV games that are controller only and they're good, but presumably less uptake as not everyone has a controller. The controls for a game have to be pretty simplistic if you can distil them all down to the lowest common denominator: the touchscreen.
Tim open the petty cash drawer in your desk and buy RockStar/Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., Activision Blizzard, Valve Corporation and Ubisoft and lock them in a room until they come out with 100% Apple Silicon versions of all their top games.
Tim open the petty cash drawer in your desk and buy RockStar/Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., Activision Blizzard, Valve Corporation and Ubisoft and lock them in a room until they come out with 100% Apple Silicon versions of all their top games.
Personally I think they would have done better buying some small to medium sized game companies (since they probably had AA in the pipeline back then) than spending $3bn on Beats.
elijahg said: As others have said, Apple needs either to buy a game studio or pay for a big exclusive. I've been playing The Rise of the Tomb Raider again lately through Steam, and it's just a totally different class of game to anything on Apple Arcade. From the story to the physics, the animations, sound, music and graphics. Everything is several orders of magnitude better than anything on AA. If Apple stops treating gaming on their devices as a bit of a hobby, they may end up being serious competition to consoles.
That's a 2015 game that originally released at $60 and had 15-20 hours of gameplay in story mode. Higher production value, sure, but also a much higher price for the amount of entertainment when new.
Adding support for Xbox controllers was great, but I find the responsiveness not great, and so many games are impossible to exit with the controller! Frustrating. Our family will now go and try to decide between a Switch, Playstation, or Xbox.
The PS4 controller has the same issue, the PS button shows the AppleTV control centre for some stupid reason unless you hold it down for 2-3 seconds, which then takes you to the home screen. Really annoying.
elijahg said: As others have said, Apple needs either to buy a game studio or pay for a big exclusive. I've been playing The Rise of the Tomb Raider again lately through Steam, and it's just a totally different class of game to anything on Apple Arcade. From the story to the physics, the animations, sound, music and graphics. Everything is several orders of magnitude better than anything on AA. If Apple stops treating gaming on their devices as a bit of a hobby, they may end up being serious competition to consoles.
That's a 2015 game that originally released at $60 and had 15-20 hours of gameplay in story mode. Higher production value, sure, but also a much higher price for the amount of entertainment when new.
It was much more yes, but the potential audience for something like that is massively larger on iOS than it is on the original target PC/Console so the costs could be less. And if Apple is serious about AA like they are about AppleTV+, they need something like TRTR to convince people - even if that means losing money on it at first, like they probably are with AppleTV+
Tim open the petty cash drawer in your desk and buy RockStar/Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., Activision Blizzard, Valve Corporation and Ubisoft and lock them in a room until they come out with 100% Apple Silicon versions of all their top games.
There was news that AT&T was looking to sell the gaming divisions of Warner Media:
That site suggests $4b possible purchase value. Mortal Kombat might not match Apple's taste though. The problem buying a studio is it's not clear if or when they will deliver in future. It would be easier and cheaper if they could just commission projects, including game ports from major studios. They'd get more value from 800x $5m game ports than a $4b studio.
Subscription game services either need a high volume of short games or highly replayable games. Even most big AAA games aren't enough because they usually get played once and take about 3 years to make. The exceptions would be ones like GTA, Fortnite, which have a lot of gameplay in them. Simpler games can be made quickly, the following studio seems to manage a game a month:
I doubt they sell over 1 million copies of each title. Apple could probably commission games like that for under $1m each and boost the library of games to a few hundred. The company says they have 12m monthly active users:
Card games are another genre like Hearthstone and Gwent that people play regularly. Strategy games like Civilization are replayable too. Not all game types translate well to the TV though. For AAA game subscription to work well, they'd need multiple studios working on titles in parallel to ensure a constant stream of new titles.
One problem to overcome is that mobile has produced the free-to-play IAP model, which is very successful. It allows a high volume of players access to games while a much smaller volume of players pay a lot of money, especially the whale customers. A flat subscription model with no IAPs is nice to have but it cuts out the huge revenues that the whale customers generate. Some games would benefit from having prepaid IAPs like Need For Speed for vehicle upgrades. The NFS app offers a subscription for in-game credits.
Game ports and a high volume of low-cost casual games would help keep up the subscription numbers and that buys time to experiment more to find those rare games that maintain player interest over a long time.
There seems like a lot of potential in this that just needs a few things to fall into place, the Macs on Apple Silicon being one. When the Apple TV and Macs all reach a certain minimum graphics level (2-4TFLOPs), that opens up so much potential for publishers because it's a huge addressable market at a low price point that would rival consoles.
The problem is that apps have to support such old devices. If I submit a game today with iOS13 SDK it has to run on an iPhone SE (1st generation) and 6S. So if your game has to run on 5 year old hardware...
Apple should allow apps to target certain hardware much more than thy do.
Why buy an iPad Pro for gaming if the games run the same on an old device?
I agree most of the games are lacking depth and some are just plain raw feeling. The occasional gem appears every quarter or so and when that happens I enjoy the service. Just finished playing Little Orpheus and enjoyed the heck out of it. A good example of the kind of game Arcade puts forth at their best though it was a short experience. The service is no platform killer and perhaps Apple doesn't care if it is.
Beats said: We know Apple devices are capable of Switch-like titles. We're disappointed that we have zero experiences like that.
Apple TV is capable of running 4K HDR. Imagine these visuals but better and in 4K Dolby Vision:
That's running on an old ARM chip.
I'm not a graphics whore but it's infuriating seeing all that Apple power go to waste. With the A14 chip coming in months, new Macs and hopefully a new Apple TV. I want to see Apple do something great.
Dunno...if you don't consider Oceanhorn 2 graphics to be on par with Switch, then I don't know what to tell you. The dynamic lighting and particle effects in that game were certainly higher quality than what's being shown in that Ethan Carter clip.
The switch game looks more power intensive.
Also keep in mind:
1. The Switch is far less powerful.
2. This is Apple's "AAA" showcase game, Ethan Carter is "just a game" on Switch.
3. Apple is capable of 4k Dolby vision. Switch can't come close to either,
The problem is that apps have to support such old devices. If I submit a game today with iOS13 SDK it has to run on an iPhone SE (1st generation) and 6S. So if your game has to run on 5 year old hardware...
Apple should allow apps to target certain hardware much more than thy do.
Why buy an iPad Pro for gaming if the games run the same on an old device?
Yup that was my point of supported outdated hardware. Apple wanted to cast the widest net at the cost of quality.
I believe Apple should have A14 exclusive Arcade games. With Apple Silicon Macs coming it would be ashamed if Arcade was still catering to iPhone SE. Won't help gaming on Macs at all.
Comments
This is my point exactly. There's nothing wrong with played-out game concepts but why should we subscribe if it's all it offers?
That's great your child enjoys it. Some of us don't have kids and your child will someday grow up too. If Arcade doesn't change don't be surprised he asks for a "game console" when he gets a little older.
Why is Apple so against FPS games for example? I just want more variety than quick bite-sized games.
That said, there are a few really good games on Apple Arcade: Sneaky Sasquatch is quite fun, What The Golf is great, Beyond Steel Sky is excellent (if you can cope with the endless bugs and crashing). Oh and Spyder is good too. However, the quantity of quality games isn't enough for me. Not one of the games showcase the iPhone's graphical prowess either, most are silly casual games with typical "phone game" graphics and little replay value. I'm very unimpressed by the graphics on the AA games, which is a shame because the hardware is really powerful and some of the non-AA games look really incredible. Presumably Apple isn't paying devs enough to have the top tier artists and modellers.
Another issue seems to be lack of new content for existing games. Only one game I've played on AA (Sneaky Sasquatch) has had a content update in the last 6 months. Dunno if Apple just stops paying the devs for anything but bug fixes when the game is released or what, but lack of new content certainly doesn't help engagement.
As others have said, Apple needs either to buy a game studio or pay for a big exclusive. I've been playing The Rise of the Tomb Raider again lately through Steam, and it's just a totally different class of game to anything on Apple Arcade. From the story to the physics, the animations, sound, music and graphics. Everything is several orders of magnitude better than anything on AA. If Apple stops treating gaming on their devices as a bit of a hobby, they may end up being serious competition to consoles.
https://www.ign.com/articles/rocksteady-netherrealm-wb-sale-att-batman-mortal-kombat
Mortal Kombat, Batman Arkham games, Tak games and Disney games like Disney Infinity:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocksteady_Studios
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetherRealm_Studios
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avalanche_Software
That site suggests $4b possible purchase value. Mortal Kombat might not match Apple's taste though. The problem buying a studio is it's not clear if or when they will deliver in future. It would be easier and cheaper if they could just commission projects, including game ports from major studios. They'd get more value from 800x $5m game ports than a $4b studio.
Subscription game services either need a high volume of short games or highly replayable games. Even most big AAA games aren't enough because they usually get played once and take about 3 years to make. The exceptions would be ones like GTA, Fortnite, which have a lot of gameplay in them. Simpler games can be made quickly, the following studio seems to manage a game a month:
https://elephant-games.com/games/
Big Fish Games publish games like those from multiple studios:
https://www.bigfishgames.com/us/en.html
I doubt they sell over 1 million copies of each title. Apple could probably commission games like that for under $1m each and boost the library of games to a few hundred. The company says they have 12m monthly active users:
https://www.geekwire.com/2019/qa-one-year-job-big-fish-president-jeff-karp-aims-transform-company-fewer-bigger-better-games/
Card games are another genre like Hearthstone and Gwent that people play regularly. Strategy games like Civilization are replayable too. Not all game types translate well to the TV though. For AAA game subscription to work well, they'd need multiple studios working on titles in parallel to ensure a constant stream of new titles.
One problem to overcome is that mobile has produced the free-to-play IAP model, which is very successful. It allows a high volume of players access to games while a much smaller volume of players pay a lot of money, especially the whale customers. A flat subscription model with no IAPs is nice to have but it cuts out the huge revenues that the whale customers generate. Some games would benefit from having prepaid IAPs like Need For Speed for vehicle upgrades. The NFS app offers a subscription for in-game credits.
Game ports and a high volume of low-cost casual games would help keep up the subscription numbers and that buys time to experiment more to find those rare games that maintain player interest over a long time.
There seems like a lot of potential in this that just needs a few things to fall into place, the Macs on Apple Silicon being one. When the Apple TV and Macs all reach a certain minimum graphics level (2-4TFLOPs), that opens up so much potential for publishers because it's a huge addressable market at a low price point that would rival consoles.
If I submit a game today with iOS13 SDK it has to run on an iPhone SE (1st generation) and 6S.
So if your game has to run on 5 year old hardware...
Apple should allow apps to target certain hardware much more than thy do.
Why buy an iPad Pro for gaming if the games run the same on an old device?
The switch game looks more power intensive.
Also keep in mind:
1. The Switch is far less powerful.
2. This is Apple's "AAA" showcase game, Ethan Carter is "just a game" on Switch.
3. Apple is capable of 4k Dolby vision. Switch can't come close to either,
That's sad.
Yup that was my point of supported outdated hardware. Apple wanted to cast the widest net at the cost of quality.
I believe Apple should have A14 exclusive Arcade games. With Apple Silicon Macs coming it would be ashamed if Arcade was still catering to iPhone SE. Won't help gaming on Macs at all.