Apple may not come out and say “hey, we’re really interested in gaming,” but I think we all know what its intentions are. You don’t have to look past the company’s last two product announcements to see that it has major plans for the gaming industry.
And that’s never been more apparent than with the new iPad. With a quad-core graphics processor, Retina display, and Bluetooth 4.0, Apple’s tablet is one well-designed controller away from being a full-blown console. And game-makers are starting to take notice…
Epic Games president Mike Capps recently talked with Reuters on what the new iPad means to game developers. Here’s what he had to say:
“Apple is definitely building their devices as if they care a lot about ‘triple-A’ games. It is quite easy to imagine a world where an iPad is more powerful than a home console, where it wirelessly talks to your TV and wirelessly talks to your controller and becomes your new console.”
Even Frank Gibeau of Electronic Arts agrees that the iPad could eventually replace traditional console systems. “When the iPad gets to the processing power that’s equal to an Xbox 360 and it connects to a television, that’s no big deal to us. We’ll put the game through the iPad and have it display through the television.”
iPads and other iOS devices can already connect to TV sets via AirPlay and the Apple TV. Add a Bluetooth 4.0 controller into the mix and you can see how game developers could start referring to the setup as more of a console system rather than a mobile gaming device.
All of the pieces are lining up, someone just needs to take advantage of them. Firemint touched on it last year with its multiplayer-over-AirPlay Real Racing 2 title. But even that barely scratches the surface of the possibilities. Stay tuned. This could get real interesting.
