|
Just as console gaming caught up to and overtook traditional PC gaming, there are strong indications that tablets could be the next big gaming platform -- at least until the next-gen consoles reveal themselves.
Indeed, according to Gartner, worldwide sales of media tablets (iPads and Androids) rose from 17.6 million in 2010 to 63.6 million in 2011 and are expected to grow to 103.5 million this year and to 326.3 million in 2015.
And tech providers -- like mobile graphics provider Nvidia and engine provider Unity Technologies -- are doing all they can to supply developers with whatever they need to create games that challenge AAA console titles head-on -- as evidenced by some of the demos at the recent CES show.
"There's no doubt that we have under-utilized technology in the tablet space," says Ben Cousins, general manager of mobile developer Ngmoco Sweden.
"With the iPad 2 and some of the more powerful Android tablets, we've got devices that are approaching the power of the current generation of HD consoles -- and probably surpassing the Wii.
"I am convinced that this calendar year we will see tablets that match the power of the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360... especially with the proposed power of the iPad 3 and with some of the upcoming chips from the big Android device chip makers."
 Cousins also believes that, in addition to comparable horsepower, tablet games will run at higher screen resolutions -- exceeding 720p -- which is higher than many of today's HD console titles.
But in order to take on console games, developers need to stop making tablet games that are merely ports or HD versions of smartphone titles, he advises.
His research reveals tablets have completely different usage patterns than smartphones despite the fact that they run on the same OS and are made by the same manufacturers. Which is why their games need to be more like console or PC titles, he says.
"Tablet games need to be more involving, like console games... they need to serve customers who are using the device for longer periods of time than smartphones... they need to be adapted to their bigger screens, like console games... and they need to be more entertaining for longer, evening play periods, like console games," he explains.
"Unlike with a smartphone, based on the usage patterns we've seen from consumers, it's completely conceivable to have a fully immersive experience on a tablet akin to an Uncharted or a Skyrim."
|
Printer-Friendly Version
That's pretty much the shortcoming of tablet gaming right now. Games are either scaled-up (HD) versions of smartphone games, or scaled-down clones of console titles. Both cases that completely ignore the potential for tablet gaming.
Tablets are expensive as much as high end gaming computers after all. Yet consoles keep on holding their ground in this situation, despite a considerable amount of limitations on the gaming experience in comparison.
To predict tablet "game quality" overtaking console "game quality" is beyond a mere graphical power statement, which is heavily dependant on the quality of innovation from the developers in this scenario.
Beting on 3rd party acomplishment is always a tricky task. Still share the same view of the article, anyway:
"1. The "mobile gaming is a joke" meme will dry out; 2. At least one competitive mobile gaming community will arise."
So your trying to tell me that when the 360 came out - it was as fast as the average desktop that came out at the same time?
If that is true. That would be sad. But I don't think that was true.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/The-500-Gaming-Machine,1147.html
As such, I'd say that arguably - and considering the fact that developers can squeeze more out of a console thanks to the fact that it has standardised hardware - the Xbox 360 was roughly on a par with home computers of the time. It's just that Moore's Law has marched on in the meantime...
(and even that's debatable in some ways: RAM has become cheaper and GPUs have become more powerful, but CPUs haven't gotten that much faster; instead, they've become multi-core and/or been shrunk down for mobile devices...)
I'll give up an Amen to that, brother!
By then we will be on the 720.
I also think this comparison of consoles vs tablets is absurd in the sense of control systems. The touchscreen is fine for some games. But for others it sucks.
I do think that Sony should have made the Vita tablet sized. Further differentiated themselves.
Still tablets aren't going to offer anywhere near the best graphics and power. One look at the size of the 360 or PS3 tells you that.
The GPU in the iPad 2 and the iPhone 4S is incredible, and does hold its own pretty well against the 360 and PS3. So if the rumored iPad 3 speed bump comes true in a few weeks, I think it's highly plausible we'll see it surpassing current gen consoles in a number of ways.
Physical size is a rule of thumb measurement. If the iPads gpu is so powerful how come we don't see them in our gaming pcs and how come are gAming pcs are so big?
The answer is because it is nowhere near as powerful.
The fact it can do some things that the 360 hardware can't do is a circumstance of it being built 7 years later and having some small previously done in software function encoded in hardware.
Just look at the type of game Infinity Blade is for further proof. Do you see big open 3d worlds? Nope.
Portable systems will never offer as good of a "price per spec" ratio as dedicated home consoles or PCs since your buying a new screen every time.
When consoles are designed they tend to have upper level pc performance, by the time they actualy hit retail they are normaly closer to mid level. If the ipad3 or any of that (short) generation of tablet could run a good looking game like skyrim at 1024x768 that would be low end pc quality, not mid and at a $600ish price tag.
On top of all that, tablets have a major disadvantage with high end graphics beyond battery life and thats the inability to deal with heat dispersal. That is what holds top end hardware back, so it will definetly have a big impact moving forwords with tables within the next few generations. IMO Without a mouse, keyboard or a dedicated controller tablets may get thier share of passsive gamers but very little to none of the hardcore market. Touch and tilt is not even close to adequate for most games or genres.
In closing i'll say the thought of a nice $600 tablet that would play high end games at 60fps and had wireless mouse and keyboard would be a great item for LAN parties!! But thats far off and still not a replacement for dedicated consoles.
"When the Consoles Die -- What Comes Next?" Likely very low cost streaming set top boxes. But thats another subject. imo
Not saying one way or the other about the overall point of tablets vs. consoles, but the majority of the above mentioned arguments just don't seem to matter. At best, you could say even the cheapest iPad 3 will cost more than a console, but as you mentioned, it includes its own screen, not to mention portability. Other than that, I'd stick to the input options to champion consoles.
http://blog.laptopmag.com/nvidia-demos-quad-core-kal-el-processor-5x-the-power-o
f-tegra-2-but-with-longer-battery-life
Also from a resolution perspective, the Tegra 3 was able to process video at 1440p (2560x1600)(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPN3hHI9y-E).
...now display technology just needs to follow suit.
From a price perspective, low end 7inch ASUS tegra3 tablet with Android 4.0 has been announced for $250.00
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/computers/ces-2012-nvidia-talks-tegra-3-and-tablets/73
20
For the record, I don't think tablets are going to replace consoles in the near term (until someone figures out a viable control pad replacement, and figures out how publishers can make money on big budget AAA titles). However it seems the industry continues to innovate at a very rapid clip.
http://www.industrygamers.com/news/john-carmack-unquestionable-that-m obile-will-
surpass-current-consoles/
quote (from John Carmack on July 7, 2011):
"...almost certainly, 2 years from now, there will be mobile devices more powerful than what we’re doing all these fabulous games on (in reference to Xbox 360 and PS3) right now."
...But the fact that it’s gotten that close that fast - that means that almost certainly, 2 years from now, there will be mobile devices more powerful than what we’re doing all these fabulous games on right now."
I was responding to statements like these:
"tablets today are getting closer in power to 7 yr old hardware. I think it is hype. Tablets still need quite a few years in order to catch up to the 360."
and many of your other comments in your first post... which seem to high in opinion and emotional content and light on the facts.
Not that I'm not excited about some of the great games a tablet provides, of course.
ablet-concept-design-at-ces-2012
Perhaps something like this that clips to the outside of your existing tablet? Something akin to the circle pad pro?
But sadly, the average player is all about graphics nowadays....
There are many multiplayer and even competitive games that do not require tight physical controls. If Nintendo made a Mario Party app for tablets, that would be something. How about Magic the Gathering Online? Of course, these require users to maintain connectivity reliably, which we are getting there I believe.
I do have an idea for a tactics based game that players can play similar to Words with Friends, alternating turns and then 'sending' the moves. But Im not entirely convinced the game would be engaging enough...
However...
1) the Xbox 360 was released in 2005 and we're likely to see a successor announced this year (though it's debatable as to whether this new machine will be released in 2012 or 2013). It's not unreasonable to expect this new machine to routinely push out 1080p graphics at 30+fps
2) the low-power architecture used in tablets means that they don't have the processing capabilities of an equivalently clocked "desktop" part. The gap is smaller than it used to be, thanks in part to the switch to multi-core CPUs, but this lack of horsepower can impact game development - for a vaguely comparable situation, look at what happened when Dead Rising was ported from the Xbox 360 to the Wii.
3) High-end graphics (and complex AI/physics modelling, etc) require the CPU/GPU to run at full speed. On a console which uses external power (and an external display), this doesn't pose an issue; on a battery-powered tablet with it's built-in, backlit display, this can be a major issue. For instance, you could potentially drain an iPad with less than six hours of gaming, and then have to wait up to 8 hours for it to be fully recharged!
4) Touchscreen/tilt controls are not best suited to managing fast, real-time action, and that's what the majority of AAA console titles involve (Halo, GTA4, Gran Turismo, Uncharted, Call of Duty, etc). The GTA3 port to iOS is a prime example: everyone appears to have praised it from a technical viewpoint while damning its controls as unwieldy. In addition, touchscreen controls are relatively imprecise - and the problem arguably worsens as the screen size decreases - and they take up room on the screen, reducing the player's visibility of the action.
5) Screen size: a tablet screen is unlikely to ever be larger than 12", and there's an increasing number of 7" tablets out there now. No matter how high the DPI of the display is, that limits visibility of what's happening on screen, as compared to viewing the action on a modern TV. Then too, the tablet is the controller, so you have to hold it in an ergonomic position for controlling, rather than in a position designed to maximise visibility of the screen.
I'm sure people can - and will - bring up counterpoints to all of the above. And there are things which can be done to address some of the above points - there are ways and means to streamline controls, for example. But generally, I don't think traditional AAA game designs can be mapped onto tablets, and even if people do manage to port games across, I don't think there's a particularly large audience for them.
Admittedly, it's perhaps something of a chicken and egg situation: without the games, there's nothing to drive interest in new games. And you can maybe draw comparisons with the early days of gaming: the initial wave of "home gaming" titles (computers and consoles) were generally arcade ports which would be considered casual by today's standards; it took a long time for deeper, more involved games to break into the mainstream...
Same goes for its technical performance.
I don't consider any of those things to define "quality." I think design is what defines quality, and designs can be brilliant on any platform. I'd even argue that browser games have already matched the quality of console/PC/tablet/mobile/Facebook games. Orisinal and Immortall shows that brilliant games can come from anywhere from anyone.
In the meantime, I can only point out that making powerful hardware smaller is hard, very expensive, and while I appreciate the optimism of hardware manufacturers and tablet developers a world in which next-gen consoles can be "caught up to" in 1-2 years seems unlikely. I'm not sure why anyone would own a desktop at that point, which is why I don't see that point in time arriving anytime soon.