If Google happens to be trying to stuff as many announcements and feature launches in this years Google I/O conference, they are doing a very good job at it. The Android Market is having a slew of new features announced and a graphical overhaul done. Some big ones include 99 more countries will have access to paid apps and 4GB file size limit.
We would just like to take this opportunity to point out to Epic that their reason for Infinity Blade and official Android support in Unreal Engine not having happened partly being due to the file size limits being too small is now a thing of the past. With that said, here are all the changes we see so far with the Android Market:
- Top Developer badges – These are given to developers who qualify as a Top Developer. They are little blue icons beside the developers name.
- Grid Layout for more apps – This is for when you click on the ” More from this developer” link on the Android Market site. More apps/games will be displayed in a grid layout instead of a list which looks a hell of a lot better.
- 4GB file size limit – This is a huge increase and should make a lot of developers very happy. I know it will make us gamers happy!
- 99 Countries – 99 more countries now have access to paid apps and games making a grand total of 131 so far. It’s about time.
- Developers can now exclude phones – When uploading your app and game in the developer console, you will now be able to exclude phones that are not compatible with your game or app.
- New Lists – There are a few new lists on the Android Market website which include: Trending, Top Paid, Top Free, Top Grossing, Top New Paid and Top New Free. These lists will be different depending on what country you are in. Also, on the Android Market app there will be two new sections in the app description: Users also viewed and Users also installed. These two lists will be live in the near future.
- Editor Choice list – Essentially like being a featured app but these apps and games are chosen by staff.
- Personalized Recommendations – Pretty self explanatory. This, however, won’t be live until later this year.
- Content Filtering – You’ll now be able to filter content on the Android Market on your device according to it’s content rating
- Refund Period – The refund period is changing again. This time though it should make everyone a bit more happy. The refund period will start after the download is completed instead of when it starts. So you’ll have 15 minutes to refund the app/game after the download is complete.
So far this is everything we have seen so far announced and/or changed on the Android Market website. All of these are now live on the Android Market website except for the personalized recommendations which is slated for a release sometime later this year. These are some extremely positive changes to the Android Market that should make developers and users very happy. If you find anything else, let us know and we will update the list!
