when Apple first introduced the iPhone, it was originally envisioned by Steve Jobs that all third party apps would be required to run in the browser. Safari has an entire API for developing mobile application-styled web pages that can be gesture aware, and contain an extremely limited amount of hardware information (screen orientation, location, etc). There was no App Store, you just published your URL for your app.
it it wasn't until a good deal later that they relented and announced native (although still heavily sandboxed and curated) access to the hardware, and that launched the entire Obj-C devkit and the curated App Store as the only authorized method of distribution - largely because Steve was extremely worried that a device that was so personal in nature could be easily hacked and abused (and hey, going through a company-run store ensures that they get a cut of the take as well, so win all the way around eh).
so once upon a time there almost existed a world where apps and games running inside a browser would have been commonplace.
Looking like WoW and playing like WoW are two different things. WoW is very smooth and polished, most browser games are severely compromised (usually in more than one way).
If it's a great fun game and looks good (and with that I mean the art style, not just the technical aspects of the graphics), I'll play it. As a PC player, I'll ofcourse still have the nagging feeling "it could be even better if they hadn't gone down the browser route", but I can live with that. If browser based makes more money for the devs, more power to them.
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when Apple first introduced the iPhone, it was originally envisioned by Steve Jobs that all third party apps would be required to run in the browser. Safari has an entire API for developing mobile application-styled web pages that can be gesture aware, and contain an extremely limited amount of hardware information (screen orientation, location, etc). There was no App Store, you just published your URL for your app.
it it wasn't until a good deal later that they relented and announced native (although still heavily sandboxed and curated) access to the hardware, and that launched the entire Obj-C devkit and the curated App Store as the only authorized method of distribution - largely because Steve was extremely worried that a device that was so personal in nature could be easily hacked and abused (and hey, going through a company-run store ensures that they get a cut of the take as well, so win all the way around eh).
so once upon a time there almost existed a world where apps and games running inside a browser would have been commonplace.
As a PC player, I'll ofcourse still have the nagging feeling "it could be even better if they hadn't gone down the browser route", but I can live with that. If browser based makes more money for the devs, more power to them.