iPhone games look and feel so much better

[640k]

Well if this is true then thank-you for the correction. I thought apps could not run off the SD card

correct me if i'm wrong but isn't running applications off SD memory extremely slow? (i haven't used a high price SD card so maybe that was my issue?)

the games aren't RUNNING from the SD card, per se. the binaries that exist in the RAM are what makes games and applications happen. all of the resource-intensive other stuff can be accessed via the SQ card.

so large 3D games can stick all of their graphics, music, sound, etc., out on the SD card.

btw 16GB > 8GB if we're comparing APPLEs to oranges here...

 

[satchef1]

There is good news on the games front. Up until now Android has been sub-standard because it uses OpenGL ES 1.0, but Android 2.0 brings support for OpenGL ES 2.0. What this means is the Droid (in theory) is capable of games of the same quality as the titles being developed exclusively for the 3GS. I say in theory because specific hardware differences will mean a difference in exactly what is possible, but that should play to Android's strengths in the long-term as hardware takes off (Snapdragon and beyond).

The bad news is that things are going to continue to suck for those using older handsets.

Hopefully it's not too long before we start seeing some titles. I'd expect iPhone ports at first, quicker to do and less of a financial risk than developing Android games alone (though I bet a few devs will develop from the ground-up for Android).

 

[Dave12308]

One of the reasons iPhone games are better is because you have 8gigs or more of memory/storage to run your apps from. Google is working on a solution to be able to run apps from the SD card, when that happens you will see better games for the droid. As developers will be able to make larger files with their games. As it stands it is hard to make a good game with great graphics and keep it small enough to run on the droids internal memory. Look at some of games file size for the iphone/itouch. They are huge compared to games availble on the droid.

Actually, Droid games CAN store the majority of their data on the SD card; and only place a launcher stub app in the main phone memory. Off the top of my head I can name at least 3 games I have installed right now that put the majority of their data on the card. Quake, Quake 2, and Space Physics all store the level data on the SD card.

 

[Mojo]

One of the reasons iPhone games are better is because you have 8gigs or more of memory/storage to run your apps from. Google is working on a solution to be able to run apps from the SD card, when that happens you will see better games for the droid. As developers will be able to make larger files with their games. As it stands it is hard to make a good game with great graphics and keep it small enough to run on the droids internal memory. Look at some of games file size for the iphone/itouch. They are huge compared to games availble on the droid.

Actually, Droid games CAN store the majority of their data on the SD card; and only place a launcher stub app in the main phone memory. Off the top of my head I can name at least 3 games I have installed right now that put the majority of their data on the card. Quake, Quake 2, and Space Physics all store the level data on the SD card.

Yeah... that's already been pointed out to me. And I admitted that I stood corrected and learned something new.

With that being said has anyone tried out speedforge out? It is awesome! And works great on the Droid.

 

[astevens54]

I could go on and on about why I think the Droid is a better device than the iPhone/iTouch. It's the ap department that is a little disappointing.

I too had a Touch dumped my Blackberry for the Droid and love it, as for apps give it some time I think your will be pleased there eventually..

 

[darreno1]

BTW, if anyone is still in doubt regarding the Droid's gaming potential, check out the speed forge 3d demo(thanks gixxer).

 

[Laurence5905]

Quake and doom work just fine

I tried Doom, and although it didn't lag or anything, it was totally unplayable because of the controls. The keyboard is just too darn small (for me, anyway) to be able to use it to control a game like Doom.

Haven't tried Quake yet. Are the controls the same (or similar) to Doom?

 

[skourg3]

There are quite a few factors that go into the iPod Touch/iPhone having superior games at this point in time, some of which I'm a little surprised haven't been brought up.

First is Apple's ridiculous App Store process, which despite being seemingly nonsensical at times probably still weeds out some of the bad games from the market.

Second is the fact that hardware for the iPhone/Touch is very specific. Sure, there are multiple generations of them, but being able to develop applications when you know (and can test on) exactly what your customers are using gives you a huge advantage. Look at how good xbox 360 games look at 1080p. They can compete with modern PC games in many cases, and the system isn't new by any means in hardware terms. Developers know how to get every bit of power from these systems because they don't have to account for different hardware, different running processes, etc. On a more open system you just can't test everything.

Third is, well, the iPod Touch in general. Devs can make games for an mp3 player (and don't forget that the iPod Touch is more or less just an mp3 player to many parents, with games thrown in to occupy their kids on long car rides, etc) that parents will buy their kids well before these kids have any cell phones, much less a smartphone. Put simply, the market for games on Apple's mobile OS is much larger than the Android market, so devs stand to earn more money. As of right now, Android is pretty much just a smartphone OS, with some expansions into tablets and netbooks, both of which are gadgety and not on the mass-market scale of an mp3 player.

Given time, Android will have more games with more polish to them. Unless something changes in the consumer electronics space, however, I wouldn't be surprised to see Apple keep the lead indefinitely.

 

[chaostheory6682]

Will the arrival of Flash for the Droid help create games that don't lag and feel so, "PC", (for lack of a better word.)?

All the games on my iTouch look great and def. don't lag at all or force close suddenly for no reason. In my experience, Mac stuff simply works and the droid def. feels like a dang PC. *shrug* I like my Droid and would never consider AT&T, but the apps avail. for the iPhone are so much better.

how could you say that games on a pc lag. sorry don't work that way. Give it time and the droid will be there

 

[chaostheory6682]

One of the reasons iPhone games are better is because you have 8gigs or more of memory/storage to run your apps from. Google is working on a solution to be able to run apps from the SD card, when that happens you will see better games for the droid. As developers will be able to make larger files with their games. As it stands it is hard to make a good game with great graphics and keep it small enough to run on the droids internal memory. Look at some of games file size for the iphone/itouch. They are huge compared to games availble on the droid.

The Iphone just like the droid has limited memory for running programs. The Iphone does not have 8, 16 or 32 gigs of ram and has problems of it's own with running out of memory for apps and from my experience with the droid, yes portions of programs can be saved to the sd.

 

[MikeDroid]

Why did gameloft bail and..

I def. have a Droid. I do not have an I phone. I have the iTouch. I would never use AT&T. The Droid in many, many way is far superior to the the iTouch. Being able to run multiple apps is a huge bonus. I love being able to fully customize every aspect of the droid. From widgets to individual setting, it's awesome. The screen feels 100 times better than the iTouch. All three keyboards are awesome and only had a short learning curve. I remember when I first started typing on the iTouch adn it was a total pain in the ass. Not so with the droid. And the camera and video is also kick ass!

That being said, the games all suck for the most part and was very disappointed when Gameloft bailed. I'm sure time will help with developers. I just needed to vent and point that out.

I could go on and on about why I think the Droid is a better device than the iPhone/iTouch. It's the ap department that is a little disappointing.

I have an iTouch as well and the apps are leap years ahead of my Droid. Any 'sane' developer would port their apps to the Droid for Verizon will sell one million units by year end(!):motdroidvert:

 

[scottjays]

please don't shoot the messanger. I own a iphone 3gs and the droid. don't ask...
seriously I love the droid, even with it's lousy bluetooth voice dialing feature. but I agree with the OP. Nearly all my iphone games are truly great. I have not found a single android game that's comparable to the iphone games. example: the iphone texas holdem game, which was realeased in the app store when the app store originally came on line looks amazing!! real video clips of other players and a slick interface. I have not found any "great" holdem games for the android. sure there a plenty of poker games avail in the market but not great. there are many other examples of great looking games not avail for android but I will hold off comparing til later.
again I love the droid even with it's shortcomings but the iphone def has better games.

 

[JhankG]

I sold my iPod Touch 3rd generation because I thought the Droid would fill the same needs. I absolutely love the phone, but I really do miss having actual games to play like I did on the Touch. It is still very early on, so I haven't lost hope.

 

[Anomander]

I have an iTouch as well and the apps are leap years ahead of my Droid. Any 'sane' developer would port their apps to the Droid for Verizon will sell one million units by year end(!):motdroidvert:

I think it is only a matter of time before we start to see that happening. I wonder how much re-coding the developers will need to do to get some games up and running on the droid? It would also be very nice to see a dev to take advantage of the gpu on there too.

 

[Raven]

I have not found a single android game that's comparable to the iphone games. example: the iphone texas holdem game, which was realeased in the app store when the app store originally came on line looks amazing!! real video clips of other players and a slick interface. I have not found any "great" holdem games for the android. sure there a plenty of poker games avail in the market but not great.

I also have an iPhone (3G) and just recently got the Milestone. No doubt the iPhone has the gaming advantage (maybe the only advantage it has?). I'm with you on the Texas Hold'em game - I got it the moment it became available and have played it almost every day since. In fact I still play it, having a highscore of around 170,000,000, hehe. Like you said, unfortunately no Android Hold'em game comes even remotely close to it.

However, I really enjoy the Snesoid emulator on the Milestone, playing one of my all time favourite games; The Lost Vikings - which I have completed many times in the past (even on emulators on other phones), but to my amazement I found that The Lost Vikings II actually plays perfectly on this emulator. I've never played the sequal before, so I am really having a great time with this awesome game! And even though I am not able to access the payed version of Snesoid (lite version missing save/load states), it really does not matter in some games like The Lost Vikings which has passwords for each level

Sure the graphics are a bit nineties, but the gameplay is unbeatable in some of these old console games, IMO.