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So are tablet games considered console or PC?
Jimmy_Scythe
Member CommonPosts: 3,586
So I got into a discussion with a friend of mine about the whole tablet thing. I personally don't see the point in dropping $500-$800 for what basically amounts to an oversized iPod Touch, but my friend started talking about the "post-PC" world and how he had completely replaced his laptop with his iPad. And that got me thinking about labels.
Technically, tablets are computers. Smartphones are also computers. Hell, regular cell phones are computers. But none of these devices are the same as the machines that we use to get actual work done. Yet when you go to someplace like Tiger Direct or Newegg and look under the computer tab, you'll find iPads and Android tablets listed under 'Tablet PCs.' Huh?!!
So that begs the question: Are games for iPad and Androit tablets PC or console games? I mean, it's easier with the iPod Touch and iPhone since we can just throw those in the mobile games catagory. But games built exclusively with tablets in mind just don't fit that niche.
The iPad also doesn't fit into the console catagory. The PSP and Nintendo DS are both portable consoles, but the iPad and Motorola Xoom lack that kind of focus. I mean, I can read ebooks, listen to music, and watch movies on my PSP, but at the end of the day it's still built to play games. Tablets weren't built to play games. What exactly tablets WERE built for is beyond the scope of this post, but it sure as hell wasn't to play games.
I also can't see tablets as PCs. At no point have I, or anyone I have ever come in contact with, said "Ya' know, I really wish that my PC was more like my smartphone."
Sure, the long battery life and instant on features are selling point, but the limitations of the interface just outweigh those factors when it comes to real work. And don't get me started on the price to power ratio. Between laptops and tablets, the laptop wins when it comes to doing anything useful.
So there it is. I don't know how to classify tablet games. I can't call games like Dungeon Defenders or 100 Rogues bad, so I can't throw tablet games entirely in the "shitty" catagory. I can't call them mobile because the devices themselves aren't very mobile. I can't call them PC games because the devices are closed systems with limited functionality. And I can't call them console games because the devices were just not built for gaming. <sigh>
What do you guys think?
Comments
Mobile fits, because that's the point of a tablet.
What do I win?
I used to play MMOs like you, but then I took an arrow to the knee.
A fully digital, non-autographed picture of Chuck Norris. . . ?
Or were you hoping for somthing more?
You win my agreement. If I had a nice digital CHUCK NORRIS picture, I'd give you that too.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
@OP
You're over complicating the issue. It is called a "Tablet PC" because it is a "Tablet PC"...or "Portable PC". Other's also call it a "Hand-held PC". Regardless, it's a PC.
Now I want a signed photo plz.
Ready for GW2!!!
They are clearly a portable, non-upgradable console! And just like with consoles, they can only do a fraction of that which a PC can do.
EDIT: Oops misread the title. Thought you meant the tablet themselves, which I still stand by what I said. As for the games, I really can't say because a majority of them are only playable on such devices, and I've sworn of all consoles/handhelds long ago. And I honestly don't know what Tablet games can also be played on PCs, don't care, because I only play games that are released on PC, thus I don't look into what else is out there very often!
imo they are mobile, certainly not PC games systems
The iPad business model is the same as the console business model: don't make that much money selling the hardware, but then take a cut of all software sales.
But the along come products like this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834152278
That runs Windows 7, so it can run all of the usual PC games. Well, some won't be playable, but some will run pretty well, at least if you plug in a keyboard, mouse, and/or gamepad, as appropriate to the game.
So maybe the iPad is a console and the MSI WindPad is a PC?
Actually, whatever we decide now, we might have to change it next year when tablets powerful to be functional like a real computer start launching. AMD's Hondo APU will have performance that would have been respectable for a budget gaming desktop five years ago. ARM Cortex A15 and Qualcomm Krait might bring performance on Android tablets in that ballpark, too. Even Intel might jump into the game with Silvermont Atom in 2013, at least if they can finally make a graphics part that actually works. Which they probably can't.
Then again, there's still the problem of the form factor. What good would gaming on a tablet with the performance of a high end desktop be, if you can't control the game very well through a clunky touch-screen interface?
Personally, I'm expecting to see tablets with a detachable keyboard (and touchpad, etc. on the keyboard part), so that they can be used like a laptop when desired, without adding much to the cost of the tablet.
Actually, I'm thinking that tablets will be more like the Eee Pad Slider. Tablets really are just over-sized smart phones after all, so why break what ain't broken.
On the other hand, there's already debate over whether or not the Slider is actually a tablet. . . .
Honestly I think tablets are a fad which will soon die out once the limitations are appreciated. Particularly with regard to gaming.
With technology the limits are only in the present. Tomorrow is a different day just as it was for the once scoffed at PC.
I didn't mean the technological limitations. I meant that people don't really want to snatch 5 mins of gaming during a toilet break.
How about 2 hours on a train or 12 hours on a bus. Or hell, 48 hours on and off in a hotel.
We live in a fast food world that was once McDee's and is now Italian, Indian etc. A decade or two ago it was the gameboy.
Its a Cell phone OS, not PC; tablets use close to the same OS as mobile phones use currently; I work for a wireless carrier in the US; and even if windows makes one, it will be a mobile version of windows
I remember the gameboy, it sat in a drawer while I played on my SNES. People go home over an evening, fire up their PC and log into their favourite game for a few hours of escapism. I don't think people travel to a meeting on a bus in quite the same frame of mind. I am probably wrong.
For Android, the tablet version of the OS is forked version of the phone OS. They are just now getting around to having the same version for both tablets and phones. My phone, sadly, isn't new enough to run it. :-(
Windows 8 (in development) is supposed to be one platform across devices that will run it. I think Windows Phone is a version of Windows 7. Microsoft is actually pushing development of HTML 5 apps that will run on any Windows 7-ish device. Microsoft will somehow mess this up though...they mess up every other version of their operating systems.
Tablet games are Mobile Games, not Console or PC games.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
It depends on the OS of the tablet really. What we mean with PC games are really Windows games, we never really counted Macs and Linux computers as PC when we talk about games either, even though both are personal computers as well.
Windows 8 is made so it can run fine on tablets so games on a tablet with that is a PC. An IPAD is a Mac.
If tablets were going to stay at their present level of performance and functionality indefinitely, then I'd agree with that. Current tablets are more "toy" than "computer".
But they're not going to stay there. Right now, they're mostly using chips that were designed for a cell phone and then put in a larger form factor, which doesn't get you the performance that you should be able to get in a larger form factor. A few use chips designed for laptops and then scaled down, but that isn't ideal, either. Next year, we'll have chips aimed right at the tablet market, and able to make good use of the extra power consumption that a tablet form factor can handle as compared to a cell phone. The move from TSMC's leaky 40 nm process node to 28 nm HKMG process nodes from TSMC and Global Foundries will help greatly, too.
Read up, I've already responded to this point. I'm probably wrong, but I was not necessarily talking about technological limitations.
@OP
Tablets are considered tablets or mobile.
If between PC and console as only choice then obviously PC.
It is as close to console as apple to carrot
Deffo not console.
Far as I'm concerned, a "tablet" is just an oversized and overpriced mobile phone.
WINNING!
I used to play MMOs like you, but then I took an arrow to the knee.
Sorry. . .
I'm not a pedophile. It takes more than a picture of a twelve year old dressed as Cammy to qualify one for WINNING. . . .
There are a lot of businesses that are betting tablets are hear to stay. They will get better over time.
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Are you guys kidding me? My tablets have single handedly kept me occupied in the john for a significant portion of the last couple of years :-P
I love my laptop which replaced a lifetime worth of desktops, my pad can VPN into my desktop and do everything from there. No it can't play all the games but the games out are fairly diverse. And they'e getting pretty darn inventive too. How many indie PC developers you hear about striking it big with the likes of Angry Birds or Sword and Sworcery.
All in all, I don't know if I consider it a console or a PC but I do know that for its practical applications, I like it. Alot.
P.S. And rumor has it Amazon is set to announce it's new android based tablet next week. FYI.
Bathrooms are for books, bro.