Theprogressiveowl
While we absolutely love the platform that mobile gaming provides for independent creators — seeing the rise of some truly creative titles that wouldn’t get a look-in under a big-name publisher — there are some places where it fails miserably.
We’ve all downloaded at least one of those games. You know, where you open it, and within five minutes are deleting it from your device in disgust, wishing you’d never taken the time to download it. Here are some of the trends in mobile gaming that we hate the most.
Pop-up ads from hell
So you’re merrily playing along, when all of a sudden your game grinds to a halt and an ad flashes up on the screen. You’d like to close it and be on your merry way, but there’s some sort of timer on the close button, leaving you staring at the screen in both bewilderment and irritation for a few seconds while waiting for it to appear.
And, of course, there’s always the chance that you manage to somehow accidentally tap the ad, navigating you away from the app and into your phone’s browser — sometimes crashing your game in the process.
If you’re playing a game for free, this is the price, so generally we just suck it up and deal if we’re enjoying the game. A minor inconvenience is worth the developer getting paid. In a paid app, it’s unforgivable.
Some apps do a decent job of integrating ads without interrupting the flow of a game; a discreet banner here or there, or an ad on the loading screen. If your advertising is at the point where players feel the game is little more than a vehicle for it, your strategy is bad and you should feel bad.
When you’re shopping for a new mobile game, it’s important to bear a couple of things in mind. It’s a very small percentage of games that is completely fresh and original; while more indie developers do gravitate toward mobile than console, most of the games you’ll see are very similar to other games. If a game feels like it’s consistently in your face with annoying pop-ups or persistent requests for money, shop around — chances are you’ll be able to find a similar game that does none of those things.
Touchscreen Madness
Touchscreens are just not well suited to joystick and D-pad controls. Without tactile feedback, your fingers tend to wander about, miss buttons and slip. There are a few products that can alleviate this; third-party controllers can be used for Android devices, and iOS 7 will be including controller support.
This isn’t the fault of the developers; they’re working with a difficult platform and consumer demand. However, it’s rare that a digital D-pad doesn’t cause some level of frustration. First- and third-person games that implement decent touchscreen controls are relatively rare, but they do exist.