Guy plays WoW on iPhone, universe explodes

by Kevin Kelly { Jul 9th 2007 at 12:15PM }

Boy, if this is the future of gaming on the iPhone, then someone had better order up a load of bifocals and a side of patience, because just watching this gave us a headache. He's using a program called Telekinesis that basically streams video from your laptop through your iPhone, and it's not like the game was ported to it specifically, but we sincerely hope gaming on the iPhone will eventually look pretty much nothing like this.

Since Apple was so keen on putting games on the iPod, it's a sure bet that there will be gaming happening on their white-hot cell baby at some point. Hopefully it'll be something a little easier to play than World of Warcraft, and it'll make better usage of that multi-touch technology. We knew that web-based iPhone games would be popping up almost immediately, but we also wish those rumors that there was a Nintendo / Apple iPhone gaming merger coming out were true, too.

[Thanks, Joe W.]

Tags: iPhone, World of Warcraft, WorldOfWarcraft

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Tadioku @ Jul 9th 2007 12:18PM

wtf

raiden @ Jul 10th 2007 1:25PM

He's just using a stupid VNC program. I did the same thing. I played Halo PC on my PSP.

horngreen @ Jul 9th 2007 12:20PM

I think they should port this AS IS to the iphone. I would truly enjoy watching all those WOW nerds wander into traffic while trying to finger zoom into the fine print.

Konstantino @ Jul 9th 2007 12:22PM

Geez, that doesn't even look like fun.

hairball @ Jul 9th 2007 12:26PM

Iphone gain 276 exp in hacks skills

Daniel @ Jul 9th 2007 12:27PM

Lame... slow... and unplayable.
Wake me up when there's native Starcraft for the iPhone

hvnlysoldr @ Jul 9th 2007 12:32PM

When we change our avatar will that retroactively affect all of our previous posts?
And quit it with the Apple rumor. Nintendo would buy them out first anyway.

nimby @ Jul 9th 2007 12:42PM

Is it the phone or the program that mde him have to retouch the screen just to get it to slide, and move over more of the picture? I thought their touch screens were supposed to be pretty good. I agree with the completely unplayable,but kinda neat because they are the first to do it thinking.

wolfchanger89 @ Jul 9th 2007 12:42PM

this looks weird. it doesn't look like this would be useful at all. Although it is pretty cool this guy was able to pull something like this off

Edog Lost @ Jul 9th 2007 12:48PM

I would love to play some Halflife 2 on my iPhone.

Ska Oreo @ Jul 9th 2007 12:50PM

woah. That's crazy awesome!!!

Jermaine Pulliam @ Jul 9th 2007 12:52PM

I gotta try this when I get home

Dan @ Jul 9th 2007 12:54PM

Unplayable, and the camerawork makes my head hurt.

Jermaine Pulliam @ Jul 9th 2007 12:55PM

why is mario next to my name?

Nushio @ Jul 9th 2007 12:59PM

Deep in our hearts, we're all Mario Fans! :)

Jermaine Pulliam @ Jul 9th 2007 1:01PM

LOL..this is true.

Mr Mobius @ Jul 9th 2007 2:01PM

It must kill anti-nintendo fanboys to now post on Joystiq.

valdemiro @ Jul 9th 2007 1:00PM

very cool! Now to find my old copies of Grim Fandango and Fallout!

puffin @ Jul 9th 2007 1:11PM

So it's basically streaming gameplay video from his Macbook Pro to his iphone. It's not like the iPhone is actually doing any type of rendering of anything other then decoding video as it's uploaded to it (and it's having problems doing that as well).

None story... nothing to see here

tack @ Jul 9th 2007 1:29PM

wow puffin, did you come to that conclusion all on your own without reading the first paragraph? you're amazing.

Tony Bowman @ Jul 9th 2007 1:25PM

guys, this wasn't supposed to be fun or playable. it was a "proof of concept" and a rather cool demonstration of the Telekinesis software(Mac-only). the point here is that if you can manipulate and use software as complex as WoW, then things that are much simply would totally be usable. log in to you computer from the road using your iPhone, launch iTunes, set it to download a movie or a show and by the time you walk in the door, BANG! you content is waiting for you.

lots of possibilities. and considering Telekinesis is just a few days old, i think it's pretty awesome.

Raikage @ Jul 9th 2007 1:29PM

Wow that sounds awesome! Especially because I have a MacBook Pro, but, No iPhone:(

ryan bean @ Jul 9th 2007 1:26PM

Still the question goes unanswered, Can it play Doom?!?

Raikage @ Jul 9th 2007 1:35PM

I'm just guessing but if the iPod can do it, the iPhone can surely do it. Anyway, is there a flash based DOOM game out there?

waynski1457 @ Jul 9th 2007 1:41PM

am i the only one who thought of mario paint? and yes it should be able to play just about anything.

JS Beckerist @ Jul 9th 2007 3:21PM

I was thinking more "march of the mini-marios" but who knows?

Mario Paint rocked!

Mike @ Jul 9th 2007 1:49PM

Wow.. that scrolling feature where you drag your finger, DOESN'T work! haha.. ihype?

Raikage @ Jul 9th 2007 2:03PM

Two fingers iTard. Just like the MacBooks.

Evan @ Jul 9th 2007 1:52PM

Isn't this what Sony fanboys were talking about a year ago... streaming PS3 graphics onto their PSPs? What ever happened to that?

DNB @ Jul 9th 2007 1:54PM

This is FAKE! People dont play WoW on macs!

Michael K. @ Jul 9th 2007 2:01PM

people do play wow on macs idiot

Cheezedog @ Jul 9th 2007 1:57PM

You think that it being a Iphone you would not have to type in a thing when it gots a perfectly good microphone and earpiece...

chaz @ Jul 9th 2007 2:04PM

well, maybe you wouldn't raid Kara with this setup... but you could fish.

Ratchet the Lombax @ Jul 9th 2007 2:15PM

This is great now all the WOW addicts can get out of their parents' basement and out into the real world. But take it slow because that big bright thing in the sky can burn your pasty skin better get some SPF 90 just to be safe.

riggs @ Jul 30th 2007 10:39AM

i dunno whats sad ridiculing the WoW players, or not knowing what the name of the sun is.

zwarrior @ Jul 9th 2007 2:26PM

Gaming on the iphone is the death of the PSP, maybe even the DS amongst tech savvy people

Sizer @ Jul 9th 2007 2:37PM

Hmmm, you can do this much nicer (for half the price) with a Nokia N800 using the VNC client. But of course it wouldn't be on the JESUSPHONE.

ill trooper @ Jul 9th 2007 2:48PM

Except the N800 isn't a PHONE, so you'd be better off touting the n95 like all the other iPhone haters. Good day sir

Sizer @ Jul 9th 2007 2:57PM

You know, I don't hate the iPhone, I just think this is a spectacularly bad demo. So many iPhone people gushing about how the iPhone lets you do things that windows mobile pda-phones have let you do for years as if the iPhone invented them.

The real killer 'innovation' of the iPhone is the UI (as expected from Apple), not its feature set, which for now is fairly weak. This is what everyone should be playing up. The multitouch is pretty cool tech, and I have some hope for this in the future, but it's underutilized so far.

It's just embarrassing when people get all hyped up about stupid things that other devices have been able to do for years. Apple doesn't invent. It perfects (eventually).

KingNeyo @ Jul 9th 2007 2:55PM

Well, it looked good on paper, but in practice... No.

Shmil @ Jul 9th 2007 3:51PM

my hopes were raised then dashed accordingly

Alan Joyce @ Jul 9th 2007 4:15PM

My full article on this is located here: http://www.everythingdigital.org/weblog/archives/2007/07/wow_on_my_iphon.html

It wasn't intended to be playable, just a proof-of-concept. I did find that chat was tolerable though.

YO-Q @ Jul 9th 2007 6:14PM

this guy should be shot in the ass for showing this stupid unplayable non practical, unimpressive, lame, stupid, pointless, video of gaming on iphone.

trent @ Jul 9th 2007 11:04PM

it looks like a bunch of missed clicks to me.

lakawak @ Jul 10th 2007 4:19AM

what concept os it proving? It would only be a proof of concept if he got it to RELLY run ont he phone. No one needed to prove that you could stream video to the iPhone. It doesn't matter that this video happened to be WoW. It could have been anything and it would hve been the same thing.