Back in May, I wrote a quickfire review of sorts of the iCADE, a little arcade cabinet for the iPad. Around the same time, I also turned down two commissions to review the hardware for British magazines, primarily because I believed at the time that the hardware wasn’t reviewable in the traditional sense—the lack of support by third parties meant it was impossible to rate. The hardware was solid, but the only game at the time you could use with it was the mediocre Atari’s Greatest Hits; making that car crash about 20 per cent better certainly wasn’t worth a 75 quid investment, and yet it seemed wrong to massively downrate great new hardware due to poor support.

iCADE support has since grown, albeit slowly. But it was interesting that when I recently interviewed a bunch of major publishers involved in retro-gaming, they remained utterly tight-lipped about iCADE plans. To my mind, it would make perfect sense for Taito, Namco, Capcom and others to support the hardware, but what we’ve instead seen is a handful of indie developers quietly adding iCADE support to their apps. I no longer have an iCADE to hand, but I imagine that mini cabinet with Mos Speedrun or Minotron is probably a great pairing.

What’s most curious, however, is the lack of support from majors might be down to them working on their own systems. TouchArcade last week reported on Atari’s own stick, which strikes me as an odd idea—it’s portrait only (many of Atari’s games aren’t, nor are many of the apps that support iCADE), and a good chunk of the games in Atari’s compilation weren’t originally designed for joystick control, which is part of the reason they never really clicked for me with the iCADE. And earlier today, developer Stuart Carnie linked through to the iNVADERCADE, which looks like a tiny arcade cabinet for playing Taito’s rather poor iPad version of Space Invaders (which scales up the iPhone release in a lazy manner). It’s unclear from the video on the site whether other games will be supported, but even so, as developer Paul Pridham asked:

Is the iPad controller market that lucrative?

I doubt it is, and I very much agree with Carnie’s reply:

I would think one general purpose controller would be ideal. There is no standard SDK by Apple = fragmentation

I’m not really convinced at all by the need for physical controls for iOS games, because the best developers have gotten past that limitation, but I can see there’s a certain niche appeal regarding a ‘traditional’ controller, especially one as cute as the iCADE. What I don’t understand is individual developers releasing ones for their own games, fragmenting an already tiny market, rather than seeking to support a product that already exists and is already generally liked by those who’ve used it. I’d quite like an iCADE, especially if more games supported it; but the last thing I need on my desk is a little row of iPad games controllers, each one only working with a tiny number of titles.

I must admit that I was a C64 boy. I loved the colour, the arcade games and the sound. The SID chip, in capable hands, was a thing of pure joy. By comparison, the ZX Spectrum seemed a little prehistoric, although it was admittedly a lot better for certain games, such as anything involving vector graphics and isometric design.

Two other things the Speccy had going for it over the C64 were its Britishness (it was made during a time when, amazingly, the UK was one of the biggest manufacturers of home computers, before everything went horribly wrong and the Americans took over entirely) and it looked beautiful. Only stalwart, stubborn Commodore fans would argue the C64’s beige box was anything other than an ugly breadbin, but the dinky Speccy still has an almost Apple-like charm.

I’ve been after one for the office for a while now, to happily display as a reminder of solid, beautiful British retro design. However, getting a Spectrum in good condition and for a reasonable price isn’t that simple. Luckily, I won an eBay auction at the weekend and my parcel arrived today. The anticipation of unboxing the thing, I’m sad to say, beat unwrapping my iPad. Yes, I’m old and sad, but what can you do?

Anyway: PICS!

Here’s the box. It’s a wee bit tatty, but, to be fair, the seller said this was the case, and it’s 30 years old. Man, I’m old.

 

In the box. All is looking good. That polystyrene’s seen better days, but the unit itself is looking very good indeed. HURRAH!

 

Old vs. new. That the Speccy doesn’t look idiotic sitting next to a year-old Apple keyboard says a lot about Sinclair’s designers. I wouldn’t argue the same about a C64!

Also: HURRAH! ZX SPECTRUM IS HERE!

With most media, there comes a time when people kind of stop dead, refusing to consider anything past a certain point ‘proper’. This is particularly common in music, where every generation loves the music it grows up with and then, once adult, considers contemporary music inane, tuneless drivel.

Videogaming’s much younger than music, but similar issues are becoming commonplace. I once thought I’d already hit one such bump, with the move to seemingly enforced 3D during the era of the PSX, although I’d argue that wasn’t just my then-nostalgic inclinations, but also the argument by game developers that everything had to be in 3D—an idea handhelds like the GBA, DS and iOS devices have since consigned to oblivion. However, I’ve now definitely hit one ‘I don’t get it’ bump, and I’m not alone.

Citing a Flurry report that claims a stunning 68 per cent of iOS game revenue is now from ‘consumable’ rather than ‘durable’ purchases, Ben Brooks says:

This is astonishing to me and being that I am not in the group that plays these types of games, I just can’t see the motivation to buy in-app currency to use — especially knowing that I will have to buy it again at some point.

Again, no judgment — I just don’t “get” it.

Same here. I get sequels and unlockable content. I get ‘demo’ freemium games where you play a few levels and then pay for the rest. But I don’t get the appeal of grind-oriented games were you pay for currency to spend on things, run out of virtual cash, and then pay for more currency to spend on things. It’s not about challenge or skill—it’s about how deep your pockets are. It’s the videogaming equivalent of bling, and I don’t understand the appeal at all.

Kotaku’s Mike Fahey has decided to copy and paste a commenter’s whine-fest and has entitled it:

iPhone Games Just Aren’t Any Fun

Maybe not, but this teardown is sure going to be.

I can’t count how many demos or $1 games I’ve bought since I got an iPod Touch back in 2008. Every day I was looking for new games to try out, be it on the poorly-organized App Store charts or on mobile gaming-dedicated websites. If it was free or cheap and looked half-way decent, I’d add it to my Touch and keep it around for a rainy day, or a slow day at work.

I downloaded lots of games, but only free or cheap ones, and, as everyone knows, every other system’s best games are the ones that are free or cheap!

Puzzle games, adventure games, RPG’s, Angry Birds. They all provided minutes of fun. And then I’d delete them.

I have the attention span of a — SQUIRREL!

Download a demo. Play it for a life/round/minute. Delete.

Also, I have zero staying power, because I’m not invested in the games. Tsk, eh?

Download a $1 game. Get the point. Delete. Actually have some increment of fun playing something. Never come back to it again. Delete.

Strangely, I never thought that maybe I was downloading the wrong games.

I don’t want to do it anymore. I’m sick of it. These ‘experiences,’

I like scare-quotes. They enable me to belittle iOS games really easily.

many based off similar ‘experiences’ from other companies selling similar Apps, are lifeless. Sure, Tiny Wings is beautiful to look at, but after getting to level 6 and having the sun set, I stop caring.

Also, those classic, highly focussed arcade games, such as Robotron, Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Defender and Missile Command? All rubbish.

Sonic the Hedgehog? Sorry, touch-screen controls for platformers can disappear along with the US economy. Hero of Sparta made me both stop caring AND curse the controls at the same time.

For some reason, I thought games specifically designed for other systems would work well on the touchscreen. In other news, my microwave is rubbish for frying eggs.

To be blunt, iPhone games aren’t fun.

To be blunt, I AM TEH HARDCORE GAMER!

When I look at my iPod Touch as a gaming device, I throw up in my mouth a little bit. It’s not a gaming device.

I’m slightly obsessed about the ‘hardcore gamer’ thing. And a little weird.

It’s a music player.

If we ignore every other app than ‘iPod’ and ‘Spotify’.

If it was an iPhone, it would be a music player and a phone.

If we ignore every other app than ‘iPod’ and ‘Spotify’ and ‘Phone’.

I have used it for games, or rather, tried to use it for games, for over three years now, and not once have I experienced my ‘Tetris Moment’ (Gameboy) or my ‘Lumines Moment’ (PSP) or my ‘Advance Wars Moment’ (GB Advance). That moment when all that the system is and can be is absorbed into your brain. It’s a moment of brilliance which is rare, and after three years of trying to find it amidst the mass of pointless, moronic, copycat, or just plain impossible-to-control ‘games’ on the iPhone platform, I’m done looking for it.

There are no good games for the iPhone at all.

No more wasted time trying to find a diamond in the rough.

Every other system has 100 per cent great games. Phew!

It’s beyond a needle in a haystack now. The App Store is a wasteland that I no longer feel the need to trudge through. There’s so many things wrong with it that the occasional mildly-amusing cheap game that I may be missing won’t matter.

I hate the future.

I’m going to make a prediction: games on the App Store will suffer their own market collapse at some point in the next five years.

PAGING JOHN GRUBER AND HIS CLAIM-CHOWDER MACHINE! PAGING JOHN GRUBER AND HIS CLAIM-CHOWDER MACHINE!

Be it through lack of innovation or consumer indifference, the store will cease to be the money-printer it is right now.

PAGING JOHN GRUBER AND HIS CLAIM-CHOWDER MACHINE! PAGING JOHN GRUBER AND HIS CLAIM-CHOWDER MACHINE!

How many times can people pay $1 for a game they’ve already downloaded fifty times under a different title?

No other games company and system ever recycles IP.

How many in-game lives must be lost to horrible touch-controls that can only be rectified by actual buttons?

I don’t understand multitouch, nor how to avoid games with rubbish virtual controls.

How many minutes must be wasted downloading and installing the next mini-game, only to delete it minutes later because you’ve seen all there is to see?

The Civilisation series is rubbish—there’s just this guy, standing on a field, surrounded by inky blackness. I DELETED IT RIGHT AWAY.

My time is more valuable than that.

Yet not valuable enough that I can’t spend some time writing a poorly thought-out rant about iOS gaming.

I’m not against indie games, or even spirited re-imaginations of existing games

Unless they’re on the iPhone.

but I am against the devaluation of games as fun.

Because if you ignore the thousands of fun iOS games with plenty of depth, there are no fun iOS games with plenty of depth.

The iPhone is a great device (when people don’t drive with it), and kudos to Apple for innovating in a space that had become stagnant with boring cell handsets, but games shall no longer grace my iPod Touch, or my iPhone if I ever get one.

I’m a gamer. I play real games. On real systems.

REAL MEN USE BUTTONS! AND PLASTIC CARTRIDGES! AND PAY OVER THE ODDS FOR BOTH!

Bloomberg reports that investors are starting to argue Nintendo should ditch its Nintendo-only stance and offer games for other platforms:

“Smartphones are the new battlefield for the gaming industry,” said Ohki, a fund manager at Tokyo-based Stats Investment Management Co. “Nintendo should try to either buy its way into this platform or develop something totally new.”

I’ve criticised Nintendo quite a bit recently, but I also suggested the company has multiple options regarding how to continue. One of them would be to do a Sega and go multiplatform, but that would almost certainly kill Nintendo’s (usually) profitable hardware line dead. The Nintendo ecosystem is a differentiator, an Apple-like take within the gaming industry. It’s potentially a benefit, not detrimental. The problem Nintendo faces is Apple itself’s now a competitor, and so the Japanese gaming giant needs to repsond to a changing market.

I don’t think this means suddenly releasing iSuper Mario Bros. or iMario Kart (although if Nintendo did, Angry bloody Birds would be off of the top of the charts for good), but it does mean changing its stance relating to game distribution and embracing more indies. Ultimately, Nintendo needs to stop remembering the good ol’ days of expensive bits of plastic and figure out how to rip off the App Store. Make Nintendo games cheaper and more easily accessible and ensure there are more of them, and there’s a good chance the 3DS’s successor won’t be the hardware equivalent of throwing in the towel. But carry on with ‘more of the same’ and trying to convince handheld gamers to part with 30 to 50 quid for a single game in 2013 and you’ll be on a hiding to nothing.