Cal us crazy, but we think we've seen this before. An Apple patent filed in November 2006 has just been published, describing a 3D cursor system that's surprisingly similar to Nintendo's Wii remote. The patent is likely related to the company's Apple TV set-top device and, unsurprisingly, references applications to video games in its description.
The patent describes using absolute and relative positioning of a pointer device in relation to two points positioned near a television screen (sound familiar?). According to the patent, this will allow the device to detect the movement of the remote in three dimensions. Apple has a tendency to patent anything and everything that goes through their offices, so odds are this device won't be Steve Jobs' "One More Thing" at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June. Still, we wonder how Nintendo feels about Apple's cute little idea.
Advertisements have shown us that the iPhone is a tool with a wide array of functions -- YouTube perusing, calamari ordering, and astronaut deafening, to name a few. But no commercials have warned of the iPhone's (and the iPod Touch's) sinister, newly implemented abilities -- fragging, railgunning, and gibbing. We speak, of course, of the handheld's recently developed Quake 3 Arena application, which uses the device's touch screen and accelerometer to crudely recreate that warm, familiar mouse-and-keyboard feeling. Just thinking of the possible on-the-go LAN parties we'd be able to hold is making us consider finally trading in our Zack Morris phonebrick for Apple's sexy cellular device.
This week on Ask Joystiq, we tackle Smash Bros Brawl's quirky saving preferences, universal disdain for Metroid II, the Smash Bros Brawl theme song, and the hunt for a classic Apple II platformer.
If you have any burning questions, unsolved gaming mysteries, or just a desire for musings from our knowledgeable cadre of writers, drop us a line at ask AAT joystiq DAWT com (and yes, we write it that way for a reason).
Q: If you haven't noticed by now, you cannot save your [Super Smash Bros. Brawl] game save to an SD card. However, you can save Vault data (Replays, Snapshots, and Custom Maps) to an external SD card. What gives? -Andy
We asked Nintendo the same thing and got a predictable no comment, but we expect the answer has something to do with forcing players to unlock the game's myriad characters, stages, trophies and stickers on their own. This seems a little overbearing to us, though ... what does Nintendo care if we want to just unlock everything outright? This isn't like Xbox Live, where cheaters get an unfair advantage on the Gamerscore boards -- with SSBB, the only person a cheater is cheating is themselves.
Joining the ranks of Electronic Arts in game development for the iPhone, Gameloft and id Software have announced their commitment to Apple's portable. According to its press release, Gameloft intends to develop over 15 titles.
In a post on Slashdot, id's programming wizard John Carmack lauded Apple's 70% royalty deal and distribution deal. As for the SDK, Carmack said, "Just based on the blurbs, it looks very good -- a simulator plus debugging on the native device is the best of both worlds." Id also noted it had to put in an application for development like everyone else. Can we get an official version of Doom now?
News about Spore coming to the iPhone is pretty exciting, sure, but seeing video of the accelerometer and touchscreen-controlled sim really has us sold. Apple finally released streaming video of their iPhone SDK presentation yesterday and, thanks to the magic of YouTube, we have an edited segment of just the Spore component tucked away after the break. iPhone as a gaming console? Like we couldn't see that onecoming.
During Apple's iPhone SDK press conference today, we got a glimpse of the device's gaming capability with two titles: an in-house project dubbed Touch Fighter and Electronic Arts' Spore.
Touch Fighter is a 3D space shooter using OpenGL technology. You use the iPhone's accelerometer to steer (via moving the device around) and touch the screen to fire. Our friends at Engadget (who are liveblogging the event) also noted that an optimization screen showed it was running at an impressive 27 to 30 frames per second.
EA's Travis Boatman took the stage to show off the company's first product to come out of the iPhone dev kit, Spore. Initial pictures indicate that it's the mobile version shared by other cell phones. You use the accelerometer to move your creature and, of course, there are customizing options as well. [Update: EA confirmed that Spore for iPhone should be out in September, and that they're "actively using the new iPhone SDK to develop games for the iPhone OS." John Riccitiello, CEO of Electronic Arts, said, "The animation technology in the iPhone OS enables us to build awesome games. I think iPhone consumers are going to be blown away by the games we create for this platform."]
While tilt-sensitive cell phone gaming is apparently nothingnew in Japan, domestic developers/hackers have been slow to create games that take advantage of the iPhone's built-in accelerometer. Enter Trism, a simple, match-three puzzle game from semi-pro developer Demifroce that twists things around by changing the way blocks fall as you twist things around.
A GameSetWatch interview with the developer reveals more of the story behind the game's ten-day development, and includes an excellent video (embedded below) of the game in action. Unfortunately, the forthcoming demo version will only work on jailbroken phones, but the developer says he'd love to sell the game on iTunes once the official iPhone SDK is unveiled. Apple, are you listening?
Apple is hoping you can't get enough of Rock Band, promoting on its website a playlist featuring 74 songs of the game for a whopping $73.26. At $0.99 per song, that's a savings of exactly 0% -- in other words, resist the temptation to buy the whole package (iTunes link) and feed your Phase addiction by downloading the songs you like individually (from either iTunes itself or via one of its competitors).
While the lack of savings might leave room for pause, at 74 songs (that's main setlist and quite a few of the DLC tracks), Apple still missed some of the best gems -- namely, every single bonus song. A quick search on iTunes led us to finding all but four of the bonus tracks ("29 Fingers," "Outside," "Nightmare" and the power ballad "Timmy and the Lords of the Underworld"). If you're looking for a more eclectic mix, search for the bonus 9 tracks available; that'll only cost you $8.91.
Apple recently filed to extend its trademark to include gaming-related devices, Trademork reports. This is the most recent story in a long line of rumors and speculation, all suggesting that Apple may be entering the games market sometime in the near future.
The revised trademark will associate "Apple" with a number of gaming-related categories, including "hand-held units for playing video games", and "stand alone video game machines". Of interest here is the specificity of these categories; the iPod may be a device which allows game playing, but it is arguably not a device "for" playing games, leading us to believe the trademark extension may reference an entirely new product dedicated to gaming.
On a possibly related note, Apple posted a job listing in September of last year for a "Game Producer/Designer." The position may be related to game development on the iPod series, however, and not to any new product.
Apple's new MacBook Air laptop is thin, sleek, very stylish, but we also imagine very easily lost in a pile of stacked paper. Its gaming capabilities? On par with the MacBook, thanks to the same graphics processor (Intel GMA X3100 with 144MB DDR2 SDRAM). We just hope it'll play Spore. Check out the highlights for today:
Getting psyched for next week's Macworld Steve Jobs keynote? Some of us at Joystiq, despite their gaming deficiencies, do love Apple. We present to you a flash game created specifically for Jobs' morning routine next Tuesday. Move around the streets picking up keynote essentials and avoid undercover journalists trying to learn the company's new secrets. Note: this game is Mac compatible.
Doom, the "Hello World" of the 21st century. Though not yet totally playable, the iPhone Doom project has been revived and updated and now the port even has controls (what'll they think of next?). While this may not seem that impressive when you compare the laundry list of seemingly crude devices that play Doom (including the iPod nano) with the sophisticated, powerful iPhone, it still warms our blackened hearts to ponder the iPhone's gaming possibilities.
If you want to get an idea of how iPhone Doom looks, hit up the video after the break. Even with an absence of sound and the strange touchscreen input, v0.1 is still a promising proof of concept. Rip and tear!
Two new games are available on the iPod today, and they couldn't be any more opposite of each other. One is perfectly suited to the iPod's limited controls, and was practically built to be played with the circular click wheel. The other... well... not so much.
The original Sonic the Hedgehog is now available for the iPod, featuring the full Sega Genesis classic, as well as the option to replace the game's seminal tunes with your own crappy music. We love Sonic and all, but the platforming precision required to play through this title will most likely not prove conducive to the iPod's click wheel and buttons. We expect much cramping and cursing.
Contrast this with Peggle, Popcap's ever-so-excellent casual game offering, and the other game now playable on the iPod. Of the two, Peggle's much more suited to the format, and could easily become one of the best games available for the music player. Both titles are now available for purchase through the iTunes Music Store for $4.99 USD each, and are compatible with the 3G iPod Nano, the 5G iPod, and the iPod Classic.
Read - Sonic press release Read - Peggle press release
The good news: Bomberman developer Hudson Entertainment is working on a series of games compatible with the iPhone and iPod Touch. The bad news: rather than being native to Apple's mobile OS X platform, Hudson's games will be web-based, and will be distributed via a portal with new games promised every week.
Starting tomorrow, iPhone and iPod Touch users will be able to surf to the "Do the Hudson!!" website using the Safari web browser, where they will be able to play such thrilling titles as a tile-flipping game (featuring Bomberman!!), a "Where Waldo"-style game, and a "spot the different" game.
These casual game offerings will be made available for free, although premium, paid content is a possibility for the web portal later down the line. The "Do the Hudson!!" website will also allow users to listen to classic Hudson tunes, read Hudson blogs, and watch Hudson videos. Whoopee.
A patent application filed by Apple in September 2006 has recently been published, revealing multi-touch technology aimed specifically at handling multitasking in gaming environments.
If it sounds wordy and confusing, it's because it's a patent. The technology described allows users to access a secondary application on a device without needing a second screen or overlay. If the user is tapping the screen, they're using the one interface, but if they're pressing down, they're accessing the other.
This would normally be a fairly unremarkable patent, except that the wording describes its usage as being specifically for "a game or gaming application." Our educated guess is that this patent is talking about games on the iPhone and iPod Touch, especially considering the patent references the secondary application as a "media-player," and makes at least one reference to the gaming application possibly being a "music-based game." Of course, it could also be something entirely different, or an out-of-date idea, given that the patent application is over a year old. Still, at least we know that Apple's thinking about it.
