2016 marks the 20th anniversary of the venerable Pokémon franchise, and gamers that have been “catching them all” since their childhood have an all new reason to dust off their Pokédex, rejoin the fray, and catalog the (sometimes) cute critters. As of this yesterday morning, Niantic Inc., the developer behind the popular augmented reality game Ingress, has begun launching Pokémon Go to the Google Play Store and iOS App Store by region.
Author: Brandon Matsalia
Pokémon GO has been available in the United States for only one day, and already memes are abound about how players will likely be led into unfamiliar urban spaces (read: “ghetto”) in the pursuit of Pokémon and Pokémon gyms.
2016 marks the 20th anniversary of the venerable Pokémon franchise, and gamers that have been “catching them all” since their childhood have an all new reason to dust off their Pokédex, rejoin the fray, and catalog the (sometimes) cute critters. As of this yesterday morning, Niantic Inc., the developer behind the popular augmented reality game Ingress, has begun launching Pokémon Go to the Google Play Store and iOS App Store by region.
As the number of publishers turning to the free-to-play revenue model continued to proliferate across the mobile space, French developer, Gameloft, remained the last bastion of premium priced experiences void of in-app-purchases. Gamers that sought refuge from the oft maligned “freemium” approach to content found that Gameloft offered a library of titles that were sold as complete games for one price; the revenue model most familiar to those who play games on dedicated gaming devices, and a model that many veteran gamers still expect on mobile platforms such as Android and iOS.
“Free-To-Play” are arguably the three most dreaded words in mobile gaming, but KLab Games nearly redeems the much loathed business model with their stellar ARPG, Bleach: Brave Souls. While many F2P games leverage lethargic rates of progress known as “pay walls”, KLab took a gamble on shipping a title that has so much content not hidden behind a pay-wall, that Brave Souls is easily comparable to a full priced game on a dedicated gaming platform such as the Playstation Vita or Nintendo 3DS. Brave Souls strikes a perfect balance between accessible content and in-app-purchases that affords players an opportunity to enjoy the full game without being forced to pay money to proceed further.
Thanks to titles such as SolForge, Order & Chaos: Duels, and Heartstone, collectible card games have emerged as an incredibly popular genre on mobile platforms. That EA wished to capitalize on the popularity of the genre and add to the proliferation of TCGs in the Play Store is no real surprise. However, that EA decided to put forth a TCG in the form of the Base Command mini-game included in the Star Wars Battlefront companion app, is quite the surprise.
As fans the world over await the December 18th release of Episode VII with feverish anticipation (myself included), many have turned to the recent onslaught of media offerings to get their interim Star Wars fix. With a slew of new EU novels, multiple Marvel comic books, a new animated series and the blockbuster release of Star Wars Battlefront, Star Wars fans have been fed a continuous stream of Star Wars content over the past year. But what of those Star Wars fans that are more inclined to consume content on their mobile devices? Electronic Arts sought to leave no stone un-turned in that regard, but after having spent some time with their recent mobile “RPG,” Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes, I am of the mind that this was a stone best left undisturbed.
Michael Pachter Once Again Predicts the End of Dedicated Gaming Consoles: Future of Gaming is with Hubs and Screens
Simply mentioning his name is likely to elicit groans from gaming enthusiasts of any platform, but hate him or love him, Michael Pacther remains an influential analyst and commentator in the video game sphere. This time, the famed analyst has revised one of his most frequently made predictions; the death of console gaming.
Developer of Free-To-Play Game has Game Stolen by Another Developer and Republished to Amazon Underground
Gamers are used to developers crying foul when a game is pirated by users, but in an odd turn of events, independent developer, North Pole Command Centre Limited, was the victim of another developer rather than consumers. According to a forum post by a Reddit user with the screen name, “funkst2002,” Amazon denied their submission for their game, Pocket Wrestling. Having previously published the game to Google Play, the user was confused by the rejection, inspiring them to conduct an investigation of their own.
Violating Consumer Trust: How Apple, Electronic Arts, 2K Games and Capcom are Undermining Digital Distribution
The lack of consumer ownership of digital content has long been a precarious condition that gamers have had to accept if they wished to purchase and play their favorite software titles. Be it an unfavorable end-user license agreement (EULA) or digital rights management (DRM), corporate entities have endeavored to convey that consumers do not own digital content, but rather license the content for an indeterminate period of time, during which the rights holder can terminate said license with impunity. Don’t believe me? Here is a snippet of Rockstar Games’ lengthy EULA.