iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch game recommendations

[Darran@Retro Gamer]

I've also heard that a lot of online reviews sites charge to review games, particularly youtube channels. I'm not sure if that still happens, but it was why one developer didn't get the coverage they felt was needed (sticking to their principals and all that).

[CraigGrannell]

It depends on the site. From my research on this, the sites you'd actually care about appearing on don't tend to do this—just the seedier (or, occasionally, more niche) end of the scale does. I suspect with Goatup 2, releasing the game during GDC didn't really help, but it's still baffling to see zero review coverage on Slide to Play, Eurogamer, Touch Arcade and Pocket Gamer. EDIT: Pocket Gamer have since given it an 8.

[The Beans]

That's really sad news about Jeff. We just reviewed GoatUp2 and given it 90 odd% It's a fantastic game that's well suited to iOS. Amazed his stuff isn't doing better than it is

I'm not amazed about Minter's lack of sales. He makes niche stuff. Really niche stuff. Whenever Minter moans about making no money I just mostly see a guy who doesn't understand the market and who refuses to compromise.
If he's serious about wanting to make a living he needs to drop the goats and llamas, get himself out of the 80s arcades when it comes to game difficulty, abandon his pride and put out something that has more of a chance commercially. Otherwise he's really just waiting for a lucky hit.
I got tired with his tortured artist routine after Space Giraffe tbh. If he wants money he needs to meet the current market at least halfway and make some games that can appease the masses, then use those funds to finance his more self indulgent stuff. Or start really gouging his faithful fans.

[CraigGrannell]

Really niche stuff? I'd agree he has quirky content and Phythonesque humour (also known as character), but of the game's he's released, you have at least a few that could have had some seriously mass appeal, such as Minotron, Super Ox Wars, Gridrunner and GoatUp. In my magical world of infinite money, I'd fly Greg Wohlwend over to Wales and stick him in a room with Jeff for a month, to create a Special Edition of Gridrunner. Alas.

[The Beans]

Minotron, Super Ox Wars, Gridrunner and GoatUp.

We're old farts who are used to this sort of stuff. The mass market on iOS (and most other platforms if we're honest) is not that interested in those sort of games anymore. The App Store's discoverability is poor but the reason such games fail is down to genuine disinterest from the bulk of the market. I realised how completely out of touch my tastes are these days through checking out the weekly sales chart for XBLIG over on Major Nelson's blog. There are many brilliant old school arcade experiences available for peanuts on XBLIG on the 360. The latest published Top Twenty sales chart is almost eclusively Minecraft clones, Avatar first person shooters and games with zombies. The chart has been that way for a couple of years no matter what excellent games (IMO) are released.

The app store is the same sort of thing.

[psj3809]

Can see what Beans means, i'm a big fan of the wacky llama type stuff and the crazy sounds and fart noises in his games. But many kids will probably tend to think 'what the hell?'. Be interesting if Jeff did a 'mainstream' game for the masses and see how that does, to me his games are so playable and i love the retro graphics, but just been arguing/discussing with one user on another forum about graphics in a particular game (very good decent graphics for an FPS game) in which he think the graphics are terrible. Ridiculous.

But if that person for instance thinks those graphics are terrible he'll probably faint looking at retro graphics in Jeffs games.

Its a shame Jeffs games arent bought by the masses but sadly these kids seem to enjoy crappy freemium building/minecraft style games or runner games just with different graphics over and over. Big shame

[CraigGrannell]

To clarify, I'm not suggesting Minter's games should be troubling the top ten—there's a ton of ground between fully mainstream and extreme niche (and I certainly don't believe Minter's games sit at the latter end of that spectrum anyway, although they're clearly beyond the mid point on that scale). What I find surprising is how many rabid shooter fans haven't even bothered to check out Gridrunner (which, to my mind, is akin to smashing a Cave game into a shoebox), how many twin-stick aficionados haven't played Minotron, how many vertical climber fans have yet to experience GoatUp, and so on. Perhaps it's the content or the visuals; I don't know. However, from purely Apple's standpoint, it's put games equally as oddball and graphically old-fashioned into its retro round-ups and almost entirely avoided Llamasoft.

[The Beans]

Its a shame Jeffs games arent bought by the masses but sadly these kids seem to enjoy crappy freemium building/minecraft style games or runner games just with different graphics over and over. Big shame

They're also amazingly tight when it comes to money. Not just the kids either. I showed Gridrunner to loads of friends and work colleagues and most of them thought it was really great. Only one other person actually bought it though. The rest were happy just playing the single life survival demo for free over and over. I think gamers are tightarses to a laughable degree, the amount of content they expect for their money can seem hilariously entitled as a matter of course. Knowing this, even I'm shocked by the parsimonious nature of the mobile and pad crowd.

[psj3809]

To clarify, I'm not suggesting Minter's games should be troubling the top ten—there's a ton of ground between fully mainstream and extreme niche (and I certainly don't believe Minter's games sit at the latter end of that spectrum anyway, although they're clearly beyond the mid point on that scale). What I find surprising is how many rabid shooter fans haven't even bothered to check out Gridrunner (which, to my mind, is akin to smashing a Cave game into a shoebox), how many twin-stick aficionados haven't played Minotron, how many vertical climber fans have yet to experience GoatUp, and so on. Perhaps it's the content or the visuals; I don't know. However, from purely Apple's standpoint, it's put games equally as oddball and graphically old-fashioned into its retro round-ups and almost entirely avoided Llamasoft.

Yeah good point, thats why i love retro games, underneath theyre just classic games, like you say twin stick games or platformers. If the graphics were more 'modern' i'm sure many kids might give them a try, but i'm sure some see the old skool graphics and dont bother giving it a go.

They're also amazingly tight when it comes to money. Not just the kids either. I showed Gridrunner to loads of friends and work colleagues and most of them thought it was really great. Only one other person actually bought it though. The rest were happy just playing the single life survival demo for free over and over. I think gamers are tightarses to a laughable degree, the amount of content they expect for their money can seem hilariously entitled as a matter of course. Knowing this, even I'm shocked by the parsimonious nature of the mobile and pad crowd.

Again i totally agree. I'm stunned how tight people are when it comes to iOS gaming, a game comes out for 2 quid or 69p and so many people 'think i'll wait for a sale'. And again in x amount of months theyll be moaning the app stores full of runners or freemium games - yeah one small reason is you tightwads wait for games to be free ! So they just churn out the usual crap !

They spend 300-500 quid on an iOS device and then moan about 69p for a game !

So we could afford to buy a fair few £1.99 games (and some £7.95 ones) as a kid on limited pocket money, but fast forward years later and you have 30+ something year old blokes waiting a month for a price reduction on a 1.99 game, pah !

[quantum]

I think gamers are tightarses to a laughable degree, the amount of content they expect for their money can seem hilariously entitled as a matter of course.

Nail on the head.

They spend 300-500 quid on an iOS device and then moan about 69p for a game !

True, but unfortunately, that's the way it is. I would love to write an iOS game, but it would have to be for fun rather than profit. I know deep down it's just like buying a lotto ticket even if the game turned out really, really good.

Good luck to him, but I'm not sure what other platforms he'll have more success with?

[psj3809]

Saying all that (and looking at the collectors/horders thread) i cant talk as i've managed to break loose of my retro computers/computer games hording

But now on a smaller scale i'm hoarding tons of iOS games, i should just play one game, finish, load another and so on. But with so many great titles coming out theres just so many, i'm like a kid at Xmas getting excited by the new releases every week or retro-releases on iOS, love it. At least these games are a quid or two and i'm not blowing 30-40 quid a time !

[sscott]

Saying all that (and looking at the collectors/horders thread) i cant talk as i've managed to break loose of my retro computers/computer games hording

But now on a smaller scale i'm hoarding tons of iOS games, i should just play one game, finish, load another and so on. But with so many great titles coming out theres just so many, i'm like a kid at Xmas getting excited by the new releases every week or retro-releases on iOS, love it. At least these games are a quid or two and i'm not blowing 30-40 quid a time !

Apart from Ridiculous fishing and Sonic Dash recently I have not bought a game app for some time and have no intention too. Have about 350 bought games and my kids really love loads of them but I have got to the point where I've had enough buying new games and exploring many of the unplayed ones on my iPad/itouch. These are usually played on the train or when the missus is hogging the TV.

[psj3809]

or when the missus is hogging the TV.

Yep i find my ipod invaluable for that sort of time, plus i seem to get brownie points when i dont moan (or even i encourage) my wife to watch her general crap she does on TV !

[Darran@Retro Gamer]

We're old farts who are used to this sort of stuff.

That is brilliant.
Our new stapline needs to be

Retro Gamer
The essential gaming guide for old farts

[Timothy Lumsden]

Yup - I think maybe we are old-ish farts who forget our tastes are not those of 99% of people (their lost mind..)

As for Llamasoft, it's sad as some of the games are cracking, but I think maybe he made some mistakes himself too on the promotional side. As a fan I've followed on twitter hoping to get updates and thoughts on games, but mostly it's 'curry is in the goat' etc.