EA exec: iPhone having ‘negative impact’ on mobile gaming

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EA exec: iPhone having ‘negative impact’ on mobile gaming

Speaking during a panel discussion at CES, Travis Boatman, vice president of worldwide studios for Electronic Arts’ mobile division, hailed the iPhone as “capable and powerful,” while stating that it has had a negative impact on the mobile gaming industry. “But it’s a replacement for someone who had a Razr before,” said Boatman of the iPhone. “They [consumers] still want their content but there’s no distribution platform in place so there’s a negative impact on the industry.” “These devices are capable and powerful,” he continued. “They’ll be great in the long term but it will take some time as people adapt to devices.” Boatman also described the challenge facing game publishers as consumers upgrade their phones to new devices that may or may not be compatible with games purchased for their previous cell. Apple has received much criticism for its decision to charge iPod owners for new versions of iPod games, updated to support the iPod nano (with video) and iPod classic, regardless of whether the customer previously purchased the game for the fifth-generation iPod. “If you bought a PlayStation 2 and you buy an Xbox ‘790’ four years later, do you think EA games is going to redevelop that game and not charge you for it?” he said. “It’s not inexpensive.”

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Comments

1

I’m sorry, but there’s a big difference between the PS2 and Xbox ‘790’ and an iPod 5G vs. 6G.

Posted by Kevin Crossman on January 8, 2008 at 1:12 PM (PDT)

2

The iPhone isn’t affecting mobile gaming at all. The iPhone was never marketed as a mobile gaming device, nor was it ever intended to be used as such.

To be honest, after playing with the NES emulator on my iPhone, I believe that genuine gaming on the iPhone wouldn’t be an exciting experience, mostly due to the lack of tactile buttons. Because of that, I don’t think games on the iPhone will ever take off on the scale that Travis Boatman is dreaming about.

IMHO, the big thing that might be dragging down mobile gaming would probably be the fact that mobile gaming has kind of always sucked on it’s own. Don’t blame it on the iPhone.

Posted by Matthew on January 8, 2008 at 6:57 PM (PDT)

3

@Matthew: I think you missed his point. It’s precisely because the iPhone doesn’t (yet) support games that he claims it’s having a negative impact on the market. Many iPhone owners switched from phones that supported games, so maybe they used to play mobile games and now they do not.

Whether or not the iPhone would make a good gaming platform or whether or not mobile games in general suck is irrelevant to the point he was attempting to make.

Posted by dodo on January 8, 2008 at 9:46 PM (PDT)

4

Mobile gaming could be GREAT in the future. Just shown at CES was a DLP projector that was shot out of a phone…pretty amazing. If you took that, and paired it with some kind of bluetooth controller that you could carry around..BOOM…problem solved.

Posted by Greg on January 9, 2008 at 11:35 AM (PDT)

5

I find that rich coming from a company that has had a negative effect on gaming for years…

Posted by Spadowski on January 9, 2008 at 2:11 PM (PDT)

6

well of course games that depend on tactile buttons would fail, but other games, games already available for jailbroken phones like card games (Texas Hold Em is one of the greatest selling mobile games on the market) or games that utilize the iphones unique features will be successful. The lack of buttons just means that developers are going to have to start thinking outside the box on game concepts and designs. And isn’t that that what portable gaming needs right now? Not Call of Duty 9. This is the reason the DS has taken off so much more rapidly then the pee-s-pee.

Posted by auburnguy in ga on January 10, 2008 at 6:53 PM (PDT)

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