You can’t undo technology, and the way things are progressing, our mobile devices will become the norm for day-to-day use of the Internet. Whether it’s our iPhone 6 or Samsung Galaxy Tab, we are slowly or quickly transitioning from our Laptops / PCs to these mobile devices. What this means for software developers of all stripes is that everything that was once on a 14 inch screen, will now have to be developed for that ubiquitous 4-inch mobile screen. Unfortunately this is not as easy as scaling down a webpage or game to the smaller screen, but entails developing a “new” game so as to give the playe/ user a similar experience as they had with their larger computers. Mobile pokies are gaining ground in 2016 and they are very popular!
On top of just sizing and making a pokie work on a 4 inch screen, you must ask if the game itself will be just as enjoyable as playing on its larger brother. The short answer is No! No matter what you do to a game, pokie, video or anything else you watch/play on your mobile device, it’s impossible to get the same experience as with a larger screen. Trying to watch a video or movie on your mobile phone is convenient, but it’s like kissing your cousin, it really doesn’t count. With all of this being said, gambling is less about the visual experience and more about playing the game and hoping to win some money, which no doubt gives developers an incentive to make this work with mobile pokie platforms.
The only two real players in this contest are Apple’s IOS and Android’s OS, both who provide the operating systems for pretty much all mobile devices. What system is better is an argument left for another time, but these two companies will certainlyhave to work with software developers to bring these games to market. As I mentioned, one of the biggest problems is to format these games, especially pokies, to a much smaller device. Because of the size of the screen, the buttons need to be configured in a way that maximizes their use, but does not infringe on the playing experience. When there is money involved, you don’t want to add an extra zero to your bet. Another issue is with the features and bonus rounds. As the games become more graphically and technologically enhanced, more and more features have been added, to give the players more of an interactive roll. On a Laptop/PC this works well, but on the 4 inch screen it might present some serious problems.
The benefit of just 2 operating systems offers the developers some comfort in the fact that they are already familiar with the systems, as they already have worked with these two in the past. The problem comes in the form of the various screen sizes and mobile manufacturers. In Apple’s case, it is simplified as the IOS is just used on Apple devices. In the case of the Android OS, it operates with pretty much the rest of the mobile manufacturers who invariable have completely different phones with varying sizes. Not an insurmountable task, but one that will have the developers working overtime.