Epic Games on Android gaming

[runawayprisoner]

Noteworthy quotes:

When a consumer gets the phone and they wanna play a game that uses our technology, it's got to be a consistent experience, and we can't guarantee that [on Android]. That's what held us off of Android.

If you took the underlying NGP hardware and shipped Android on it, you'd find far far less performance on Android. Let's say you took an NGP phone and made four versions of it. Each one would give you a different amount of memory and performance based on the crap [the carriers] put on their phone.

Google needs to be a little more evil. They need to be far more controlling.

Source: http://www.gizmodo.com/5789093/the-near+future-of-mobile-gaming-is-going-to-be-pretty-epic

Summary: Google needs to close Android up.

Quick note: this ISN'T about Android vs other platforms or Android phones vs other phones! And it definitely has nothing to do with a certain fruit-themed company or its products!

 

[Kabob]

Yeah, Epic said they were holding back on Android until they dealt with fragmentation a little bit, and honestly I can't blame them. I kind of see Android like PC gaming and iPhone like console gaming. I downloaded Dungeon Defenders for my Fascinate, a device it's supposed to work on, and it doesn't. When it was released it didn't run on the vast majority of "top end" phones. At the same time it runs on pretty much every single iPhone 4 out there. If there's only one way to make it, it's going to work.

 

[JD50]

Noteworthy quotes:







Source: http://www.gizmodo.com/5789093/the-near+future-of-mobile-gaming-is-going-to-be-pretty-epic

Summary: Google needs to close Android up.

Quick note: this ISN'T about Android vs other platforms or Android phones vs other phones! And it definitely has nothing to do with a certain fruit-themed company or its products!

Wait, you think Google needs to make Android closed source?

 

[zerocool84]

Wait, you think Google needs to make Android closed source?

Every one that doesn't like Android says they need to close it up. Android is obviously doing fine the way it is. Google is going to restrict it more but it's never going to be 100% closed like iPhone or even close to WP7 restriction.

 

[Bateluer]

What needs to happen, carriers&manufacturers that load their phones with so much bloat and uninstallable junkware need to be B1tchslapped back to the stone age.

Unfortunately, you only have three choices for a nationwide carrier, AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon. Otherwise, learn to live with Cricket, Boost, or Virgin Mobile.

 

[JD50]

What needs to happen, carriers&manufacturers that load their phones with so much bloat and uninstallable junkware need to be B1tchslapped back to the stone age.

Unfortunately, you only three choices for a nationwide carrier, AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon. Otherwise, learn to live with Cricket, Boost, or Virgin Mobile.

:thumbsup:

 

[Phynaz]

Pretty close to what Carmack said.

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/11/post-8.ars

 

[Bateluer]

Keep in mind, some of this is a load of crap from Epic. Some of Epic's games run on an iPhone 3G. Even fully loaded with apps and bloat from the manufacturer and carrier, I'm pretty sure my Thunderbolt still will have more RAM and processing power available to it than that antique 3G.

I'm going to bet that a good portion of of the reason Epic's games aren't out for Android are do to 1)Manager Stupidity(perception of piracy), and possibly 2)Apple threatening to pull their games from the App Store if they made games for their number 1 rival.

 

[Patranus]

Keep in mind, some of this is a load of crap from Epic. Some of Epic's games run on an iPhone 3G. Even fully loaded with apps and bloat from the manufacturer and carrier, I'm pretty sure my Thunderbolt still will have more RAM and processing power available to it than that antique 3G.

I'm going to bet that a good portion of of the reason Epic's games aren't out for Android are do to 1)Manager Stupidity(perception of piracy), and possibly 2)Apple threatening to pull their games from the App Store if they made games for their number 1 rival.

Again, pure hardware specs are meaningless.

 

[zerocool84]

Again, pure hardware specs are meaningless.

No they are not. If they provide no performance increase then they are meaningless but as we've seen, if they do increase performance then they are obviously not meaningless.

 

[QueBert]

At this point Android isn't a good gaming platform, while there are a few phones that can perform well when it comes to games. Most can't, There are games that run slower on my Droid 1 OC'ed to 1.1ghz than on my iPod Touch 1g. As Patranus said, specs are meaningless. My phone's laggy period @ 1.1ghz, so I don't expect it to play a 3d game that well.

 

[Bateluer]

At this point Android isn't a good gaming platform, while there are a few phones that can perform well when it comes to games. Most can't, There are games that run slower on my Droid 1 OC'ed to 1.1ghz than on my iPod Touch 1g. As Patranus said, specs are meaningless. My phone's laggy period @ 1.1ghz, so I don't expect it to play a 3d game that well.

And yet, that Droid 1 can and does play quite a few 3D games fairly well at its stock 550Mhz. Funny how that works. Its limitation is in its tiny internal storage more than its SoC performance.

 

[Patranus]

No they are not. If they provide no performance increase then they are meaningless but as we've seen, if they do increase performance then they are obviously not meaningless.

If pure hardware specs weren't meaningless then why does Apache Tomcat run better on Linux than Windows when on the same hardware?

If we were to look at pure hardware specs they should run the same...correct?

(Note: I never said hardware specs were meaningless)

 

[runawayprisoner]

Some of Epic's games run on an iPhone 3G.

Well, which one?

 

[zerocool84]

If pure hardware specs weren't meaningless then why does Apache Tomcat run better on Linux than Windows when on the same hardware?

If we were to look at pure hardware specs they should run the same...correct?

(Note: I never said hardware specs were meaningless)

If Epic doesn't want to take the time on optimizing a game on Android that's their deal. Games are hardly going to make or break a phone ecosystem.

 

[dguy6789]

Known Apple fans: Specs are unimportant
Everybody else: Specs are important

Anybody surprised?

 

[Bateluer]

Well, which one?

Ask one of the iPhone guys, Patranus, Quebert, etc. They're the ones always saying the old iPhones run games better than high end Android handsets.

 

[runawayprisoner]

Ask one of the iPhone guys, Patranus, Quebert, etc. They're the ones always saying the old iPhones run games better than high end Android handsets.

Well, only game I know that Epic Games has any backing in the iOS ecosystem is Infinity Blade, and if you'd consider it a game, Epic Citadel is another one.

Neither of which run on the iPhone 3G as far as I know. Perhaps they were referring to the 3GS?

 

[zoiks]

Yeah, Epic said they were holding back on Android until they dealt with fragmentation a little bit, and honestly I can't blame them. I kind of see Android like PC gaming and iPhone like console gaming. I downloaded Dungeon Defenders for my Fascinate, a device it's supposed to work on, and it doesn't. When it was released it didn't run on the vast majority of "top end" phones. At the same time it runs on pretty much every single iPhone 4 out there. If there's only one way to make it, it's going to work.

Dungeon Defenders works fine on my Nexus S.

 

[_Aurel_]

At this point Android isn't a good gaming platform, while there are a few phones that can perform well when it comes to games. Most can't, There are games that run slower on my Droid 1 OC'ed to 1.1ghz than on my iPod Touch 1g. As Patranus said, specs are meaningless. My phone's laggy period @ 1.1ghz, so I don't expect it to play a 3d game that well.

Why would you say you don't expect to play a 3d game that well on a device that apparently you claim you are smart enough to overclock, but yet can't spend 10 min of your time to download one of multitude of 3d games in order to test that assumption out?

Just asking.

 

[QueBert]

Why would you say you don't expect to play a 3d game that well on a device that apparently you claim you are smart enough to overclock, but yet can't spend 10 min of your time to download one of multitude of 3d games in order to test that assumption out?

Just asking.

I have 3d games on it, what I said wasn't an assumption, it was from my experience. The part about me not expecting it to play 3d games well is from the the fact when I scroll thru my music in cubed (text view) it's very laggy. Actually the only assumption I made in my post was when I said there are probably higher speced Android phones that play the games that were laggy on my phone better.

 

[Fire&Blood]

Among other things, I admire Apple for saying no to carriers. No branding on the front of the phone and no bloatware.

Carriers are so retarded about branding phones, it ruins the look of the phone and if they feel like they are advertising anyone close enough to a phone to see their stamp will already know what carrier the phone is anyway.

It's not like they don't already have enough retention methods to make sure the phone they subsidized stays on their network at least for the duration of the contract and afterwards it's obsolete, if not even sooner.

I hate to quote Charlie Sheen but blog commentators are bipolar.
It's not a simple open or closed platform. Funny how most folks that flame google for no longer being open are fans of a closed platform to begin with.

As of right now, Android is an "open" platform, it won't become a "closed" platform just because of few (much needed) changes. I would call this new state of Android "filtered", still open but more QC and uniformity. By definition, it remains open as long as any manufacturer meeting the demands can use the platform.



Addressing the fragmentation problem and keeping devs happy is the best way for Google to ensure the future of Android.

I find it ironic that in order to further improve the respective platforms, eco system providers must start copy/pasting from each other, to an extent.

I think that non iphone carriers should realize that they can only benefit by backing off from their branding and bloatware practices.

 

[styrafoam]

The only company who's opinion on gaming of any sort who is to be respected less than epic's right now is probably bioware.

 

[BenSkywalker]

If pure hardware specs weren't meaningless then why does Apache Tomcat run better on Linux than Windows when on the same hardware?

You get a 486/66 system w/1MB RAM and a 200MB 5.25" HDD running Apache Tomcat under Linux. I'm going to get a phase change cooled Zeon 6 core w 32GB RAM and 1TB SSD at 5GHZ and we will see which runs better. You said, specs don't matter, so let's put that to the test.

Saying hardware isn't the only thing is correct. Saying hardware doesn't matter is shockingly stupid.

At this point Android isn't a good gaming platform

In the broader sense, neither is iOS. Pokemon B/W is looking to more then double the entire App Strore revenue stream for this year, that's 1/2 games compared to hundreds of thousands. The 'failure' that is the PSP utterly demolished the entire app market last year, closest numbers I can get indicate roughly an order of magnitude(4:1 tie rate 9.2Mil hard, $29 ASP). That's widely considered a failure in the gaming market. There is no doubt that cell phone gaming is exploding in popularity, but let's be realistic here, it still is at best a very miniscule market even when looking explicitly at mobile gaming.

 

[MrX8503]

Of course specs matter, but so does software.

If you put on the shoes of a developer would you make a game for iOS or Android? Android has a larger marketshare, but as an individual device, there are more iPhones out there than any smartphone.

You can reach a much larger audience if you develop for the iPhone and the game runs better because you can devote time to optimizing it. The returns and polish is just much greater on the iOS platform.

Now does games really matter on iOS? Not sure as I don't game on it much, but the iOS ecosystem definitely helps in creating some of the best apps available on a mobile device.