It's a fruit thing...

Do you know what I fucking hate? Mobile phone games! Games... on mobile phones! They're inconvenient, generic, power hungry bastards. If this is casual gaming then there's no wonder why I'm only having a casual relationship with my phone... yeah I got the innuendo too, yuck. My point is that, for someone who doesn't have a car and doesn't want a car, or just like to sit about the house, mobile gaming could be so useful as to be compulsive, yet it infuriates me how little there is for someone like me. I'm fed up of flinging birds, chopping fruit and pressing... fucking... JEWELS! I'm fed up of games that have 1 dimensional game-play mechanics, no storyline and no attempt to recreate the experience of home gaming, be it casual or hardcore.

It's the whole idea that this is what casual gaming is all about that really gets to me. Do you know which games I'd consider my favourite casual games? Pokemon Red/Blue, and The Legends of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons/Ages... and a Link to the Past once it was ported to the GBA. Why? Because you could dip in and out of the game as you pleased, and play for as little or as long as you wanted too, and you could hop out of the game at any time. It didn't matter if you were half way through a puzzle, because you'd be right back where you left off when you resumed the game. There was no waiting for a game over screen, and it didn't feel like the levels were deliberate bite-sized chunks, they felt very organic. On top of that, the stories were immersive and deep, they felt like what we've come to expect from a big name title, because that's what they were! And yet I could still just grab a quick 5 minutes in the back of my parents car on the way to some ill fated swimming lessons.

My point is that casual games don't have to be generic puzzle games, touch to jump running games, or a thin disguise for a fitness tracking app, when you know full well you're not going to keep up that diet, and you'd rather be happy and fat than miserable and statistically more likely to kill your family. The gameboy showed what mobile gaming was really all about, long before the iphone came along and stole the concept. I don't want to sound like I'm harking back to the good old days, some innovation is always good, but I miss the depth, the adventure, and the convenience of those halcyon days.

Of course you could emulate old gameboy games on your phone, heck you can even emulate old NES and Genesis games on your phone; but Nintendo seems to have this silly idea that once you've bought their game, they still have the right to tell you what you can do with it, and what platform you can play it on. I'm not going to get into that discussion, and it's a moot point anyway because I've already said I want innovation, and some new ip, it's just that I want them to be of the same grand scale and ambition of the time before mobile games went uber-casual.

I think the course of platforms such as the PSVita and the 3DS are pretty clear, those kids in their parents cars are adults now, and their pockets are full enough of crap without carrying around another piece of hardware. Unless such gaming platforms diversify in a similar way the ipod diversified, they're going to go the way of the Mattel Hyperscan; what you've never heard of the Mattel Hyperscan? Point proven. On the other hand though, the mobile platform has to adapt and develop to it's new multi purpose uses, short battery life and heat issues already plague most smart phones, and this would only be exacerbated by constantly running a fairly intensive program over the top for an extended period of time.

The form factor also needs to change. Buttons, whilst perfectly placed for a phone, can be a nightmare for a games console. You've got the choice of either using not enough buttons bunched over to one half of the device, or the choice of not being able to see the game because the game and the buttons are now the same fucking thing. The Xperia Play did a good job of dealing with these issues, however it didn't sell very well; mainly because the form factor led to it being a fairly chunky phone. The whole idea of a chunky phone with a gaming pad apparently goes against current aesthetics, and so sales were lacklustre. I don't know what meeting we decided that gaming pads are unaesthetic, but I certainly missed the vote. It was also fairly lacking in terms of processor power, albeit it was more than enough to compete with most mid range phones out there... but that's not the sort of thing gamers want to hear.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I long for the day when I can sit down on a train. I also long for the day when I can sit down on a train, pull my phone out, and play something that isn't fucking Fruit Ninja. I mean, I like Fruit Ninja, but enough is enough!

Right, I'm done with this. xoxoxo