A few years ago, I watched the
above video of WarCraft III being played on a large touch screen interface.
Rightfully so, I was impressed. The idea of playing video games on what looked
like a computer from Minority Report was just mind-blowing. Now, just a few
short years later, that technology seems to be within our grasp with the iPad.
But is Apple’s entry into the tablet computer scene going to help revolutionize
gaming, or is it nothing more than an iPhone on steroids?
Now, don’t get me wrong – I
love my iPhone. The games I play on it are fun, varied, and cheap. Over the past
year, I’ve played more games on my iPhone than I did on my DS. From racers, to
tower defense games, to whatever the hell Rolando is, the iPhone has some
entertaining games on it. Translating that success to the iPad, however, might
not be so easy.
What’s great about my iPhone is
that I always have it with me. No matter where I am, if I’ve got a few minutes
to kill, I always have a couple dozen games to keep me entertained. However, the
biggest limitation of the iPhone as a true gaming system is the screen size,
considering that you actually have to touch it in order to play. The iPad
addresses this shortcoming… sort of. The iPad offers a 9.7-inch screen, which is
much larger than an iPhone or iPod Touch, but still small compared to a laptop
or a desktop monitor.
I understand that the iPad
wasn’t made exclusively for gaming, but let’s just pretend for a second that it
was. At 9.7-inches, the screen is big enough to take it out of the handheld
sphere of gaming, but at the same time too small to handle full-fledged games.
Take for example, the aforementioned WarCraft III demo — I think that the
iPad’s touch screen is perfect for real-time strategy games, but I’d much rather
play it on a 20 inch-plus screen where I can have a fully functional user
interface and be able to see dozens of units on screen at once.
The iPad’s screen also affects
possible control schemes. The worst controls found on the iPhone are in games
that use a virtual thumbstick. It’s unresponsive, unintuitive, and a pain to
use; yet, it’s already being implemented in iPad games like Geometry Wars. I
also don’t want to have to use a controller or a keyboard to play games on the
iPad – that’s what my PC, 360, and PS3 are for. The iPad does have a built in
accelerometer, but it’s far too gimmicky to carry an entire game’s control
scheme by itself. In order to provide compelling controls (i.e. no virtual
thumbstick, peripherals, or accelerometer), the iPad needs a large screen to
allow a greater range of movement than the iPhone.
Obviously, no matter how big
the iPad’s screen is, some genres just won’t work with nothing but touch screen
controls. First-person shooters, for example, simply can’t function without a
mouse and keyboard, or a thumbstick. Sure, developers could make an FPS work on
the iPad, but I can guarantee it won’t be as good as the exact same game on a
PC. The iPad thus faces the same precarious paradox as the Nintendo Wii: its
unique control scheme is its biggest attraction, yet at the same time, its
largest limitation.
So what games would work better
on the iPad than an actual gaming console? Again, the first thing that jumps
into my mind is a real-time strategy game. Touching a unit to select it,
dragging your fingers to select a group, double tapping to attack move… it’s
like this device was made for the RTS genre. Sure, the iPad may not have the
processing power to run Blizzard’s highly anticipated StarCraft II, but I’d love
nothing more than to play the original with touch screen controls.
On second thought, an Apple-Blizzard collaboration would probably ruin me
financially
Role-playing games could be
great on the iPad as well. With a top-down view and a control scheme similar to
the one found in the Zelda games on the DS, RPGs like Chrono Trigger or Final
Fantasy would be a blast to play. And the iPad could display vibrant 16-bit
visuals with ease. The 2D RPGs are becoming rare in this age of hyper-realistic
graphics, but the iPad could help bring them back into prominence.
Certainly, Apple’s newest
device is not a replacement for an Xbox 360 or a Playstation 3, but it does have
potential. Whether or not that potential is realized, however, depends on
whether developers create games that use the touch screen controls to their
advantage. Is the iPad going to revolutionize gaming? No, probably not… the
Nintendo DS introduced gamers to touch screens over five years ago. But the iPad
can offer a fresh, new way to play certain types of games, and it brings me one
step closer to playing WarCraft III with nothing but my fingers.
