This serves as sort of an open letter to BiggestVideoGameNerd over his video as to why mobile gaming will never overtake console gaming (he might be right but his wording, uninformed statements and general attitude pissed me off so here we go!)
Few more things before I start:
- I am NOT claiming to be an industry expert or even someone who is particularly clued up on the industry so apologies if I cock up once or twice.
- I will be researching as I go along and will reference sources both in text in the form of links and at the end of the post in the form of footnotes.
- I will be backing my argument in a number of methods that include budgeting and trans-gaming, this is NOT repeat NOT to take his arguments out of context but instead to provide mobile gaming a fair chance.
- And finally my hypothesis (Which will be repeated as I get past the video breakdown): I believe that mobile gaming will outsell and/or become more profitable and/or attract more game developers sometime in the future (be it in 2017, 2025 or even 2062)
First I'll be pulling his video apart in the form of quotes and points gathered from analysing the video (I've altered his wording to make more sense of it but it's near enough the same context, I'll leave a link to the video at the end of the post for comparison of the quotes in brackes to prove I have copied word for word and such) in order to comment on the things said in the video and in part 2 I'll be arguing for and against the success of mobile gaming.
"Mobile game can't possibly outsell console gaming": (...first of all, why that's not even possible [sic]...) Focus on the can't possibly part, as likely as him being right may be, saying that mobile gaming outselling console gaming is impossible is somewhat foolish seeing how many times the industry has shocked us, a few examples of this being: The North American video game crash of 1983[1], the recovery from said crash[2] and the overnight success of Minecraft in 2010 (cannot find a working link to it, sorry) to name a few. There is not a single person I can name that has any right to dictate whether or not the industry will do A, B or C, for all we know Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 could shatter the console market by mid-December and leave mobile gaming to take over.
"The 3DS and PS Vita are mobile platforms": (...not the 3DS and Vita, because that's real mobile gaming [sic]...) while this is technically true in terms of semantics the Nintendo 3DS and Playstation Vita actually fall into the category of handheld game systems are defined as such:
"The 3DS and PS Vita have no games": (...even though it has no games [sic]...) In a literal sense this is completely untrue but there might be some truth in saying they do or don't have any killer apps, I hate to bring opinions into this but I believe I've seen some games for the 3DS that I consider to be "killer apps" including Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D and Super Street Fighter IV 3D edition."These lightweight, portable devices include in-built screens, games controls and speakers. The dominant manufacturers include Nintendo (Game Boy Advance), Sony PSP and Nokia N-Gage"[3]
"Mobile gaming will never par console or PC gaming": (...mobile gaming can not even be on par with that technology [sic]...) Once again this requires estimation and opinion in order to make some form of conclusion so here's my 2 cents; I honestly believe that console/pc graphical capabilities have either already peaked or will peak in the next 5 years (my guess is they'll be spending excess budgets on better marketing and 3D technology, which is something Sony and Nintendo are already working on) and in accordance with Moore's law (which may or may not continue past this decade[4]) mobile processors will get better and better until the gap between mobile devices and PCs either closes or becomes small enough to allow the multimillion dollar console and/or PC titles to be easily ported to mobile devices in one form or another.
"The PS3 and Xbox 360 will always be more powerful than mobile devices": (...the PS3 and the 360 will always be more powerful than the iPod or iPad or any freakin'- any of that mobile garbage...) I essentially covered this in my last point but might I point out that there is no way the aforementioned consoles will be able to catch up with mobile devices if they do indeed progress that far. If it was Sony/Microsoft consoles or even a specific model of a specific brand of phone he was discussing I'd agree with the notion but saying a single model with always be more powerful than a series of devices is horrendously uninformed.
"Mobile "games" are apps, not games": (...no, they're not even games, they're apps [sic]...) The second part of his statement is true, they are apps in the sense that the word app is just a shorthand for application but mobile games are also games as they fit the requirements for a "game" in most cases.
"Mobile platforms were designed for listening to music and downloading applications but not for games": (...mobile platforms are designed for listening to music, downloading apps, they're not meant for gaming, they're just not) First of all let me point out that PCs originally were not intended to double as gaming systems, even looking at the first few home computers such as Commodore PET and Apple II which were released in 1977, the same year as the Atari 2600, were not designed to play games as they were marketed towards medium-large businesses. Design intentions change all the time as demand for certain features increases, on top of that we now have mobile devices geared towards gaming such as the Sony Ericsson Xperia Play and the OpenPandora.
He then asks us to explain how mobile gaming will overtake Console/PC franchises which I will do in the second part.
"Mobile gaming will not work because it does not have any online services": (...and, on top of that, um, mobile gaming ha- doesn't even have any online services [sic]...) From the start I can say this is untrue because I have played several games that had some form of online functionality within (be it leaderboards, social portals or even game matchmaking in some games) and even if it does, why does that even matter? there are great games without online and bad games with online, networking has never been integral to gaming, sure a lot of games with online have survived but, as I just said, there are games like Fallout and The Elder Scrolls that have become AAA hits without online (save for downloadable content)
And that's the end of what I can pick at in his video which can be found here.
Anyway hope you enjoyed this part of the blog post, I will be continuing sometime next week with my opinion on the whole "console/PC vs mobile gaming" debate, also I may or may not be doing a follow-up to my NSMB review as I've gotten much farther since I last talked about it (I've now unlocked all worlds and gotten past the castles on worlds 1-6) so see you then, if not I'll be back next week, bye.
Plugging my YouTube channel, new videos soon, maybe.
And the FaceBook page me and my girlfriend run.
Don't miss me too much.
TheWardy signing off.
References:
1. Hunter, W, 'Player 3 Stage 6: The Great Videogame Crash', The Dot Eaters, weblog, accessed 23rd October 2012, <http://www.thedoteaters.com/p3_stage6.php>
2. Kohler, C 2010, 'Oct. 18, 1985: Nintendo Entertainment System Launches', Wired, newspaper article, 18th October, accessed 23rd October 2012, <http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/2010/10/1018nintendo-nes-launches/>
3. 2007, 'D 4.1 – Standards and technology monitoring report [revised version]', University of Maribor, report, 24th April, accessed 23rd October 2012
4. Kanellos, M 2003, 'Moore's Law to roll on for another decade', CNET, newspaper article, 10th February, accessed 23rd November 2012. <http://news.cnet.com/2100-1001-984051.html>
