Handheld games consoles like the Nintendo 3DS and the Sony PlayStation Vita have long been suffering at the hands of smartphones and tablets. But the latest data from IDC and App Annie should give handheld game developers — including Nintendo — something to really think about.
While consumer spending on Android and iOS continued to rise during the first quarter of 2013, it fell considerably on handhelds.
EA has confirmed that it is developing a mobile version of its Frostbite game engine called Frostbite Go for Android and iOS. The engine will empower “EA game developers with Frostbite’s proven excellent workflows and features to bring true Frostbite experiences to all major mobile platforms,” EA says on its website.
Google looks set to launch a new cloud-based gaming service at Google I/O this week, dubbed Google Play Games. How do we know? Well, screenshots that show a leaked Google Play Games app running on an Android smartphone have been published ahead of the grand unveiling, and they’re well worth getting excited about.
When I hear about a game that uses miniature figurines with a videogame, I automatically think of Skylanders, Activision’s hit toy/video game that uses plastic creature figures placed on a special “portal of power” to use the creature’s special abilities in the videogame, on consoles and on iPad.
Sydney, Australia-based TableTop Interactive is going one step further to a fuller interactive experience, with mini-figurines reminiscent of tabletop games like Hero Clix or Warmachine, and gameplay that looks more like an action RPG like Diablo. The Kickstarter project is just getting started, with a £150,000 goal and 42 days left to get to it.
The release of Iron Man 3 for Android and iOS is almost upon us, and Gameloft sent us a sneak peak of the 18 different Iron Man armor suits available to the player in the game.
These gorgeous images augment the trailer Gameloft released of their endless runner (the category of game Iron Man 3 falls into) last month. The game’s out on April 25; no word about price yet. More suits to get you drooling below.
Demiurge Studios (Borderlands, Mass Effect) teamed up with Owlchemy Labs (Snuggle Truck, Jack Lumber) to announce that the Android version of Shoot Many Robots is now available for free on Google Play. Originally released in March 2012 for Xbox Live Arcade (XBLA) and the PlayStation Network (PSN), Shoot Many Robots came out a month later on PC, via Steam, and should be released on iOS soon.
Just one year after the launch of the analog land-grab board game, Small World, Days of Wonder released Small World for iPad, bringing the fantastically fun board game to the digital world. Soon after, the gaming company brought Ticket To Ride to the iOS platform, cementing its claim to best digital version of an actual board game, ever (ok, maybe that’s just me).
Secretly, however, Days of Wonder tasked a small group of developers with coming up with a bigger, better sequel to Small World. They’re now on Kickstarter, almost funded, and ready to bring the game to Android, iOS, and even Steam with the funds from the crowd-sourcing website.
The darling of the current gaming scene, Ouya, had some drama today when it was originally reported that the diminutive and open Android-based gaming console would not have online multiplayer functionality on launch, either for the initial distribution to Kickstarter backers, or even the retail launch, scheduled for June.
The updated reports, though, are now saying that there will, indeed, be online multiplayer included in shipping Ouya devices, just that it hasn’t been implemented by any developers for the tiny boxes as yet.
If you’ve played SpellTower on iOS, you’ll know what a big deal this is. Zach Gage’s utterly unique and addictive take on word game play will launch on the Google Play Store this Thursday, March 7, 2013.
We got it wrong last week, when we thought a cryptic Disney teaser was a clue to something we’ve been salivating over for a few months: the arrival of Android and iOS at Disney’s Infinity platform.
Instead, Disney has released a beautiful Toy Story 3D puzzler game for iOS and Android; and even though it’s not exactly what we’ve been waiting for, it still looks really freaking cool.
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