iPod's Number-One Killer is its Lack of Buttons to Support Non-Casual Games, and it's Limiting its Success with Mainstream Games

"Resident Evil on my iPod? No way!"

I remember thinking this very clearly when I first got my iPod touch, a kind birthday present from my parents. After jailbreaking, I immediately went through the App Store and looked up all the mainstream games, made by the professional developers, and proceeded to load them all onto my iPod. However, as I played and put down each of these mainstream titles, I found that for one reason or another, there was somehing about the game that completely turned it off to me. The game was certainly well-made, generally had decent graphics, and was essentially lag-free. So, what was wrong?

Then it hit me: touch-screen controls.

It's almost like the gimmick failures on the Nintendo DS' touchscreen, except this is a situation that game developers couldn't overcome for most games. No matter how much you try to convince the general public otherwise, touch controls for games that usually use buttons just don't feel right on the iPod. Many Dev teams see a market in iPod games, which they rightly should. If a motivated, work-at-home coder can make hundreds of thousands in profit by working a few hours a day to make a relatively simple puzzle game, it's logical to assume that an even more professionally-developed game with actual money invested in its development could sell ten times better, right? Unfortunately, it just doesn't translate. With it's simplistic design, the iPod asks for simple, pick-up-and-play games, and doesn't handle anything more than that very well.

For example, examine Tower Defense-style iPod apps. It's extremely intuitive to drag and drop the characters onto the screen into the right positions and altogether have the control at your fingertips. In this case, touch-screen controls actually benefit the game. Also, think of wooden labyrinth games; the kind based on the old wooden things you shook around to get a marble to the finish. Thanks to the accelerometer, something just feels right when you tilt the screen.

Conversely, we'll use Zenonia, an RPG, as an example. A Link to the Past-reminiscent game for the iPod. Your character is controlled by a virtual control pad, and you slash your sword/talk to NPC's by pressing the circular action button in the bottom right corner, where buttons are on any other handheld system. While I played this game, I found that I kept getting into stick situation constantly because of mis-taps on the virtual control pad and action button. If this were on the DS, for example, you KNOW where the buttons are. You don't have to look where you are pressing, because you can FEEL it when you press the button. There's a certain satisfaction when it comes to real buttons that you never get when you use a touch-screen, and that is a huge killer when trying to make games like Zenonia on the iPod.

Unless you can find a way to get around using a virtual keypad or pressing buttons with an intuitive control system that comfortable fits the iPod, the only games that can be fit for this up-and-coming system are casual gems. Touch-screen controls simply don't have the familiarity or intuitiveness of buttons, and the only way the iPod could attempt to capture a larger share of the handheld market is to redesign the iPod hardware as a model that includes buttons in some way, shape or form.



Questions? Comments? Concerns? E-mail me at revyuu@gmail.com, or post anonymously in the comment section below.