Face it. Your Apple TV is boring. It looks just like every other Apple TV, everywhere in the world. Sure, you might say it doesn’t matter, that the whole point of the little puck is to get out of the way and let you watch TV shows and movies, but that shows a lack of imagination. What you need, my friend, is a set of decals. And not just any old decals. You need decals that make your Apple TV look like a NES console.
Foxconn chief executive Terry Gou has confirmed that Apple will use some of its cash to help improve the labor conditions for more than 1 million workers in Foxconn’s Chinese factories, where devices like the iPhone, iPad, and iPod are assembled.
Apple’s iOS devices have been stealing market share from portable consoles since the day the App Store opened its doors. Four years later, they have led Nintendo to report its first ever annual operating loss of $454.4 million.
As a gamer, I’d love nothing more than to see a proper physical controller for my iOS devices. Sure, the touchscreen works great with titles like Angry Birds or Words With Friends, and accessories like the iCade work well with retro games. But for first-person shooters, soccer sims, 3D platformers and the like, nothing beats a physical controller with real analog sticks and real buttons.
Google’s Android operating system already supports external game controllers, and that’s one of the few things it has over iOS. But maybe not for long. According to one source, Apple is working on a physical controller of its own that will make iOS gaming even more incredible.
Is it time to retire game consoles? That’s the question buzzing around in the wake of Nintendo announcing its first yearly loss, forcing a downgrade of the 3DS future. The creator of Super Mario said it lost $575 million (45 billion yen), surprising experts forecasting a $52 million (4.2 billion yen) deficit. The unspoken push over the precipice: the iPad and iTunes App Store games.
We’re all fans of Mario Kart and many of Nintendo’s classic titles. But as much as we’d love to see them arrive on iOS, we don’t care much for shameless clones. We’ve seen countless Super Mario clones in the App Store, but Mole Kart is a Mario Kart ripoff that shares more than just a few similarities.
Following a report that claims Nintendo is set to open up its own app store for its upcoming Wii U console, there are now suggestions that the Japanese gaming giant is “actively courting” iOS developers in a bit to lure them over to Wii U game development. One developer reports that the company even offered “assistance” with porting their title from iOS to be played on the console’s new controller, which features a 6.2-inch touchscreen.
I fell in love with Super Mario Bros. when my parents bought me a Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) for Christmas as a young boy, and I’ve been obsessed with Super Mario games ever since. There’s nothing that would please me more than having the chunky plumber in my pocket on my iPhone. But since Nintendo refuses to bring its titles to iOS, we’re forced to play the alternatives.
But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The absence of Super Mario has spawned a number of terrific platforming alternatives that are just as enjoyable. I’ve been enjoying a number of them over the years, and thought it was about time I shared the best of the bunch.
It’s not quite Game Over for Nintendo, but Angry Birds and other iPhone games cost the company nearly $1 billion for the first half of 2011. What’s more, an aging Wii is being overshadowed as more and more gamers turn to smartphones. It’s enough to give Donkey Kong indigestion.
Even in the dark years when they were caught off guard by the momentum of the Sony PlayStation, Nintendo has kept their characters in-house, exclusive to Nintendo brand hardware. They learned their lesson from the dark days of the CD-i.
Now, though, investors within Nintendo are pressuring the beleaguered gaming giant to bring their most well-known properties like Mario, Donkey Kong, Zelda and Pokemon to other platforms… specifically, the App Store.
If you’ve ever played the classic NES fighter, Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out, you can probably sympathize with Nintendo right now: an absolutely huge juggernaut of an enemy has filled their screen, capable of knocking them out with a one-two punch… a blow that is only tipped by a sly wink a millisecond before.
That enemy’s Apple, and it is fighting with two weighted gloves with the iPhone and iPad, accordingly. Now Nintendo’s so punch-drunk that they are dramatically lowering the price of their latest console, the Nintendo 3DS, less than six months after it debuted.
After years of gamers clamoring, one of Nintendo’s hottest properties is coming to the App Store in a unique, exclusive title not available on the 3DS or Wii. That’s right, Pokemon is finally coming to an iPhone or iPad near you…
Nintendo unveiled its upcoming Wii successor at E3 in Los Angeles yesterday, and with its touchscreen tablet-like controllers and AirPlay-like game streaming, some are already debating whether the device might rival the iPad. I’m here to tell you that it won’t.
The iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad have already made Apple a huge player when it comes to gaming, with the touchscreen devices proving to be stiff competition for handheld consoles such as the Nintendo DS and the Sony PSP. However, two faces headed to the Apple camp would suggest the Cupertino company wants to get even more serious about gaming.
Late next month, Nintendo is set to release the 3DS, the successor to their popular Nintendo DS handheld console. Besides a few bumped specs, the main selling point of the 3DS is its glasses-free 3D display, which Nintendo hopes will give their latest handheld a leg up on the competition… most importantly by giving them a clear point of differentiation from the DS’s number one competitor, the iPod Touch.
How long will Nintendo have 3D superiority over the Touch, though? Perhaps not as long as Nintendo thinks. A new rumor coming out of Japan suggests that the next iPod Touch will have the same glasses-free 3D display found in the Nintendo 3DS, based upon Cupertino’s multiple patents for 3D related technologies.
Ever played Lazer Tag? If Apple has its druthers, next time you play it, it won’t be with big ray guns and fluorescent sensors, but with your iPhone.
Apple’s gaming plans are described in a newly discovered patent dated April 2009 for “Interactive Gaming with Co-Located, Networked Direction and Location Aware Devices.”
The nitty gritty’s a lot cooler than that dry legalese description, though: what Apple is describing here is away to take advantage of an iPhone’s gyroscope, accelerometer and GPS to turn your handset into an aimable device that can talk to other iPhones that it is pointed at.
I always thought the original Nintendo Famicom controller lost its allure when it made its way to the United States in 1986 as the joypad for the NES, so I’m glad to see the Famicom controller’s classic design live again, this time as a polycarbonate case for the iPhone 4. Gorgeous.
[via Technabob]
Omino is a simple platform game recently released for the iPhone & iPod Touch which claims to ‘take you back to your childhood’ with it’s retro feel. It’s clear from the screenshots that its similarities with the old Super Mario Bros. games is uncanny, but is it as good?
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjymDGnt3Lw
If you’ve ever wanted to transform yourself into a hydrocephalic Italian plumber sucked into a strange toilet dimension in order to battle a legion of evil, anthropomorphic mushrooms… well, amazingly, there’s an app for that.
Cleverly named after the phonetic transcription of one of the character’s hallmark stereotypical ejaculations, iRwego is more than just a sound board of noises plucked from the games of Super Mario Bros.… although it’s that too. What’s really cool about the app is that it uses the iPhone’s built-in accelerometer to automatically accompany your life with appropriate Mario sound effects.
