Ishcabittle Kicks Ass

Yesterday, Sony announced their intentions to create the Playstation Suite for Android, marking the first major gaming initiative for the Android platform.  Requiring Android 2.3 and above, the suite will add a Playstation store, a PSOne emulator, and PSP gaming to Google’s smartphone and tablet platform.

One of iOSs biggest strengths is that it does everything; the, “there’s an app for that” campaign may not have intended to encompass gaming, but in the end it did.  Android may have its strengths above iOS (the native Gmail application is the most glaring) but gaming is certainly not one of them.  Rovio, producers of Angry Birds, commented on the fragmented state of the platform famously after releasing their ad-supported version of their hit game.  The sentiment you get from them is that Android gaming has a long, long way to go to catch up to iOS.  Between device fragmentation, versioning fragmentation, and display size differences, developing for Android is a logistical nightmare.

So who solves this problem?  Not Google, apparently.  Sony is stepping in to develop an entire gaming framework to lay on top of Gingerbread, effectively solving the development problem but only in the context of producing for Sony’s store.  As an Android developer, do you jump ship on your current developments and shift to producing for Suite?  What are the terms to get Playstation Certified, and what amount of the app price does Sony take?  It seems Android devs are faced with the evil they know and the evil they don’t (It’s honestly too early to say that the Suite is “evil”, we have nearly zero information about the specifics).

All that being said, this marks the first glimmer of competition towards the massive lead iOS has on portable device gaming.  You can almost hear the fanboys revving their engines, each side saying their platform has the better set of games.  ”Android handsets get Killzone,” they cry.  ”iOS devices get Infinity Blade,” they shout in return.  The actual feasibility of the Playstation Suite depends not on user loyalty, but on the actual quality of the games and the quality of their performance on their platforms.  That quality in turn depends on the quality of the development environment and APIs available to those making the games, and by the time the Playstation Suite is released, iOS will be on the 4th generation of native app development tools and APIs.  Sony needs to knock this out of the park on day one to give any sort of fight.

Another factor is pricing.  Today’s dollar needs to be stretched further and further, and if you were faced with an iPod Touch at $229 and an average game price of $10 or a PSP at $249 and an average game price of $60, you would probably choose the Touch.  Especially when you know that a majority of excellent games can be had for a dollar.  It may be that prices in the Suite will be much lower than standard premium titles, and if that’s the case then the point is relatively moot, but traditionally PSP games have been very expensive and I can’t imagine they would charge $60 for the PSP version and $10 for the Android Playstation Suite version of the same title.

I’ll say that Android users have a very good reason to be excited.  Even if games are expensive, even if you have to buy a Gingerbread compatible handset to get on board, even if it doesn’t release until this fall with a smattering of games in tow, there is a definite gaming revolution on the horizon.  Cross platform, console quality games for Android, at last.

What does this means for iOS?

As of right now, not too much.  Those of us who have invested in the iOS platform will continue to use our iOS devices.  There may be a few who have both iOS and Android platforms and will benefit from this development, but I don’t see a die-hard iOS user jumping ship simply because God of War is available for Android. When the Suite launches, the people it will most effect are those who haven’t invested in any platform as of yet, the people looking to purchase their first device.  They will have the choice between the Apple and Google/Sony gaming ecosystems, each with their strengths and weaknesses.  The relative price of games, the quality of games, and the initial investment in the platform will determine where their dollars go, and while the Suite is an excellent step in the right direction, I can see problems arising from having two separate companies collaborating to create a complete gaming ecosystem.  What if a future Android release removes an API or framework that the Suite depends on to function?  What if Sony updates the Suite to a new version that requires a version of Android that your carrier doesn’t support?  It’s going to take a great deal of work and co-operation between these to companies to create a cohesive experience; I hope they are both up to the challenge.