Gaming on the Go: I Smell an iPhony

Like many forms of technology I have developed a seriously pendulant love-hate relationship with smartphones. On the one hand all I ever wanted was a cellphone that made high quality phone calls. On the other the thought of the entirety of the internet in the palm of my hand is a temptation I cannot resist. So I got a refurbished iPhone a while back. The trouble with owning a smartphone is you will eventually start loading it up with games, which forces me to question whether or not these games can in any way be comparable to those on my Xbox or PC. At first glance the answer seems to be an obvious no, but you have to boil down the concept of gaming to really look at what phone games have to offer.

Taking your games with you

As a perpetual tightwad I have always been very selective about my game system and game purchases. It’s one of the reason I love GameFly. It’s also one of the reasons I’ve never owned a hand-held system. Well, that’s not entirely true. My wife got a DS back in the day but I never got around to buying games for it. I also hate games on my cellphone, again mostly because they cost money to buy, then more money to download. Also, for a very long time they had Gameboy or slightly better graphics. The games themselves often had no depth and were nothing more than “click here faster” experiences. Of course all that is changing at a rapid pace. The iPhone brought unique user input and advanced graphics not to mention online multiplayer capabilities.