fail trends in mobile games

Anorion

Sith Lord
Staff member
Admin
continuous stream of nonsense in the loading screens

the devs think they will get smart when it comes to describing what their engine is doing while starting up. they accomplish this by belting out a flurry of one-liners in rapid succession.
world of goo
*i.imgur.com/ZfO67d4.png

when you load up agent dash, you get a steady stream of it :
downvoting reposts
straightening the traffic posts
adding sparkles
crossing the t's
subliminal message : please five star me
installing spy-ware...
deleting save data... not really...
*i.imgur.com/q0lxJLD.png


then arcane legends
adjusting buckles
brewing potions
filling satchels
filling ale...
Reciting mantras...
*i.imgur.com/M1Of55R.png
so who is drinking? the game? or the dev? drunkard didn't even say cheers

gets old real fast, by the time the game actually loads, you are mentally exhausted by processing so many "jokes"

IAP
It's not enough to just buy the game, or worse still, get it for free. Once you have got a game, you have to work at it to earn in game currency, with which you kind of need to play. Gems in agent dash, stars in star dunk, coins in lane splitter, coins in forever drive... all give you upgrades, unlocks avatars and equipment, all of which help you play the game better. Now the IAP is typically rigged in such a way that you have to spend to earn. magnets in agent dash and lane splitter, and 10x mode in forever drive. more than just playing the game and having fun, a bulk of the time is spent in grinding out the in game currency to get the stuff you need that makes the game fun.

one of the best mobile games, Galaxy on Fire 2, works entirely on this. There is something known as a Kaamo Club VIP subscription, which is basically a one time purchase you make so that dealers within a game give you a discount every time you want to buy something.

also

*i.imgur.com/ZciNYwg.jpg

Freemium
This is a very depressing model for everyone involved. The model is like this: make a game, make it free, make sure a lot of people will play it, and give advantage to the few people who are willing to pay to get an advantage. The fallout is that every game has to be wildly popular, the vast majority of the people playing the game are just content (fodder) for the the few people paying to play.
The best implementations are flawed. Nimblebit is known for coming out with great games with this model... Pocket Planes, Tiny Tower and Pocket Frogs were all fun, and it seemed that the IAP was perfectly balanced, and there was no co-ercion to pay up to play at all. It was not needed for any critical aspect of the gameplay.
That was till a huge difference emerged in the tower sizes in Tiny Tower, and network size in Pocket Planes. In a social environment, this advantage discourages the vast majority that make the title popular.
There are ofc, titles where it is far worse. Eg: Order and Chaos online.

Zombies.
The zombie apocalypse is happening right now. They have taken over the store and are spreading rabidly from game to game. And eating the brains of those playing these games.

Pro Zombie Soccer requires you to take on Zombies by kicking off various body parts with a football. That makes sense.
*i.imgur.com/YXWaoBt.jpg

Age of Zombies features a Zombie T-Rex.
*i.imgur.com/JgJLmVg.png

That makes a little less sense, but still, at least the devs did something beyond just exploiting the word "zombie"

It makes no sense however, when established titles use it as a gimmick

*i.imgur.com/8o62Sue.jpg

*i.imgur.com/1Q811T4.jpg




everything is game
first there is the stupidest video on youtube


so that's a baby monkey riding backwards on a pig
and this is the game inspired by that video



it's not a rare, one off case either

this is a retro 8bit game based on that Friday song


and this one is Nyan Cat. the basic mode is called nyan-stop. there are no barriers, traps or basically anything to stop that cat from flying through space streaming a rainbow forever... and you dont even need to control the cat to keep it going.

*i.imgur.com/vPeJhU1.png

PS, if you get bored of Nyan Cat, you can do the same thing with Taco Dog, Melon Bird or Star Sheep (by paying extra for each)
 

noob

Cyborg Agent
My problem with current games : I play Temple Run on Android phone as well as Android tablet or say iPhone & iPad. Sync saved game data across the devices. If i cleared one level using phone then let me continue from there when i play same game on tablet. AFAIK, Android has that capability but game/app developers do not take advantage of it.

Even better, If a game is avaible on both Android/iOS, let users sync saved game data acorss devices and OS.
 
OP
Anorion

Anorion

Sith Lord
Staff member
Admin
^ios devices have the capability too, and it is taken advantage of very frequently
 

tkin

Back to school!!
I don't know about you but I really like those one liners when the game is loading, instead of a simple loading bar that is boring to look at.
 
OP
Anorion

Anorion

Sith Lord
Staff member
Admin
^yeah, there are too many clones. some genres have reached saturation... tower defense and endless runner titles

then there is some kind of competition in the titles to use as many keywords as possible. Every game is gravitating towards being named Flappy Ninja Monster Birds Vs Tiny Angry Zombie Fruit. Irrespective of the content.

can't explain the pricing... it's gone insane
Asphalt 8 : Free
Asphalt 7 : Rs 300
Asphalt 6 : Rs 300
Asphalt 5 : Rs 420
 

Nerevarine

Incarnate
I think Sims 3 kinda started this .. the loading screen dialogues that is..
But the biggest fail in mobile games IMO is that they are rarely as good in story as mainstream handheld console games (PSP/Nintendo) (Yes im talking about you Gameloft :-x)
Even GBA games were much more entertaining than mobile games..
 
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