Microsoft Games to Fail on Three Platforms at Once.
Microsoft believes they have an ace up their sleeve in their competition with Apple for mobile dominance: multi-platform games. The following video demonstrates a hypothetical scenario in which one person plays a single game successively on his PC, Windows 7 phone, and XBOX 360.
This strategy will fail and fail hard.
PC and phone games are fundamentally different. Multi-touch and point-and-click games require different dynamics, thought processes, and reflexes. Accelerometers and joysticks are not equally efficient means of moving your character around the screen. QVGA does not equal SXGA.
Phone and XBOX 360 games are not the same. Hand-held, tactile devices with tinny ear buds pale in comparison to the immersive experience of 52″ screens with 10′ interfaces, wireless controllers, and booming surround sound.
If game manufacturers expect to bolt on platform specific controls and reap the benefit of multiple purchases ((You know this is what they’re thinking, right? “Wait, now I can sell the same game three times?”)), they will find dissatisfied customers awaiting them—assuming they find any customers at all.
The fundamental lesson of the iPhone is that software needs to be built with the platform in mind from the ground up. Games that work on multiple platforms must be one of two types. Either they are like the popular game World of Goo, in which the mechanics of the game were carefully crafted to apply consistently across platforms ((Not available on the iPhone, perhaps because the game does not make sense on such a small screen. See also Canabalt for a game that can work well in any environment, in this case because of its simplicity.)), or the game has multiple components, each of which can only be completed by playing on the platform that makes sense. For example, a game might be a first-person shooter for the PC & XBOX 360 while allowing character creation, intelligence gathering, or some form of turn-based activity on the phone. ((Augmented reality tie in?)) Any game that violates this principle (like the Indiana Jones game demoed above) will not provide a compelling experience on at least one of the platforms. ((Probably all the platforms will suffer because of the limited attention to each and necessity of cross-platform compatibility.))
Can you play Texas Hold’em on your phone, PC, and XBOX 360? Maybe, but that’s not what Microsoft is betting will stem the Windows Mobile Phone Series 7 bloodletting.
Matthew Chambers
I’ve got to throw in my developer 2 cents.
I agree with everything you say about attempting to create a game without taking advantage of the platform specific features from the ground up. If you want to make a great interactive experience that is the way to do it.
Taking this presentation literally the only games that could survive a deployment like this would be the most basic of games. The inputs of PC and console are rich enough to be able to translate without much pain. Adding a mobile device that may not even have proper buttons or multi touch and will most likely have limited screen real estate is going to seriously limit what can be accomplished on the other platforms. At this point you would be developing for the lowest common denominator platform.
For a lot of game companies this is acceptable. The kind of video game mills like EA or others that specialize in titles based on movies, TV shows, or toys can get away with this. Typically their target audience will not care or can overlook the concessions that will ultimately be made. The strength of their tie-in may be enough to generate a profit on the sales.
However, I think what MS is trying to do here still has value. Perhaps treating this as a panacea for the pain of cross platform mobile development is overstating the issue. In the end, this and solutions like it http://unity3d.com/ make developers drool. The entry cost for multi platform development is being lowered which is ultimately a good and democratizing force.
MS began this with their XNA initiative which I am a big fan of personally. Microsoft has had its issues with user experience, but never let it be said they neglect their developers. I don’t pretend to believe they do this for selfless reasons, but their tools are compelling.
Nate
Thanks for the input. The developer tools are an angle to which I’m mostly oblivious.