iPad (and now possibly other tablet) Gaming

[The Alchemist]

Too soon, probably. Yeah, definitely too soon.

It's no secret that I get hard whenever I touch my iPad. So can we just skip the "lol Macfag" shit or the "lol you taped 4 iPhones together didn'tya!" jokes and maybe try and have a convo about iPad games? It's definitely too much to ask the haters not to shit on my thread. I'll try not to nuke it in frustration like I did my OSX Steam thread.

Anywho, it's been about a month since I got my iPad and I've had a good amount of time to test what it's good for, and I'm happy that it went over my expectations.

But lets just talk about gaming, alright? The rest is very very -very- debatable and I really don't feel like flinging poo today. After having played several games on the iPad I realized that its definitely got its faults and adjustment period, but I definitely think it's a powerful gaming platform and I can't wait to see what else comes out.

I've not spent a lot of money on games, but I'll list the games I've kept and why, I'll also include a screenshot from every single game.

(Oh, and before I start, you can browse my public Facebook album that is nothing but iPad screenshots. Check it out here. It should be available without login in, but I'm not certain.)

Also, I should mention, since Facebook is hosting the photos for me they have been autoresized by Facebook to some different resolution, it's not the full iPad res, so some things wont be very clear, or look as good as the real thing.

My gaming page, just one of them anyway. Outdated.

Ok, game number one is an obvious one:

1) Plants Vs Zombies: The game is excellent on PC/Mac, and I enjoyed it a lot on those platforms. But it wasn't until I got the HD version (read: iPad version) that I became utterly, and horrifically addicted. This game was made by someone who obviously wished PC's came with touch interfaces, because it simply couldn't work any better. Collecting sun, sitting down your defense, everything just suites a touch oriented interface like peanut-butter and jelly. It's fucking awesome. I just beat the campaign, and the game has only just -begun- for me. I've unlocked all of my arsenal options, I'm trying to earn my 10th card slot, and I'm testing my endurance in a Survival campaign. If you like this game on the PC, you'll love it on the iPad. If you weren't completely crazy about it on the PC (like me), the iPad version just might be the one to sell you on it. There's no point in talking about the game itself, we've done that enough. I just want to specify how much more fun it is with a touch based interface. If you have a friend with an iPad and the game, I implore you to try it out. It's an experience that you don't really appreciate until you actually feel it.

Pic 1, Pic2.

2) Knights RTS: This is a SNES Real-Time "Tactical" JRPG style game. The graphics scream SNES. You control up to 4 characters, you move them around by tapping them and dragging in the direction you want to go. A flick on top of the avatar makes him perform a standard attack, and also combo attacks. A tap makes him usually do a defensive maneuver, such as blocking with a shield, parrying with a sword, or dodging back. Holding down on the character will charge up the skill attack. If you don't charge all the way, you perform a more powerful attack. If you charge up all the way, you get a cool animation and the set character skill is performed. For example one character in my party, her charge up skill is to resurrect dead party members. I haven't gotten deep into the game, but that's as much as I understand about it so far. There are other touch/gesture mechanics but I just don't know them yet. The bottom line is that it's fun to play. Now, I've only controlled 2 characters at a time, and it's fun to manage them with the touch method. But I can only imagine when you have 4 characters, it gets a bit frustrating to have to move around and manage your character actions. I could be wrong, maybe putting them in place, and flicking each character in the direction of the enemy or charging up attacks etc will be manageable. I don't know. I already promised my fiancee we can "multiplayer" it by letting her control 2 of the 4 characters. She insists on sharing even singleplayer games. Everyone insists on touching the damn thing. I wish my penis had such a magnetic effect.

Pic1, Pic2, Pic3.

3) Prince of Persia Retro: It's the famous Prince of Persia, with left and right buttons on the left, and up and down buttons on the right. Other than tactile response (which is obviously a problem with all games, and I'm a huge advocate of its removal but either I'm a huge fucking sucker or I've grown up and gotten over it) the controls are fine. It's a bit hard to manage, but that's just because the game is like that. The original had the same issues. It's not iPad related issues, that's just how the game is. If you know the game you know what I mean.

Pic1

4) Battle For Wesnoth. YES. I love Wesnoth, being a huge Linux nerd this is a flagship game for me. It's like four dollars on the iPad (yeah yeah, it's free everywhere else, but I can deal with four bucks to play it on a touch based system. It just works wonderfully. RTS's in general are just keen on this touch based system. Especially turn based ones. Again, it's the "touch" effect. It makes it more fun for no apparent reason. The developers also released all of the extra campaigns for free in updates to the app. It looks and plays great. It's Wesnoth, at 1024x768, on a touch screen. It's exactly what you would think. I rather play it on my iPad than on my computer.

Pic1, Pic2, Pic3,.

5) Eustrath HD. JRPG mecha turnbased type game. My friend described it as "mecha-pokemon". You travel the world top down on a grid, turn based. Engagements have an initial screen where you set skills to use, weapons, items, stratagy etc, and when you engage you watch the mechs go at it. The animations are solid and it feels like a true commercial production game. I think it was 9 bucks. Worth it if you're into that sort of thing.

Pic1, Pic2, Pic3. Failed at capturing the animations in Pic3. But you see the Pokemon reference.

6) BrokenSword: Murder/mystery point and click adventure game with some nice graphics. I think it was expensive though, think twice about this one. Depends on how badly you want to play a touch based adventure game (again, another genre that really benefits from the input, but hey thats just my opinion). Feels commercial.

No pics. It's 4am man, fuck you.

7) 1112 EP 02 HD: Another point click adventure game, but with more detail and much higher quality art. I haven't gotten very far but so far it's very engrossing. Another commercial quality game. I forget the price, but I think it was 9 bucks also.

Pic1, Pic2, Pic3.

8) Dizzypad HD: If you have a girlfriend, get this so that you can play it with them and they'll leave you the fuck alone. Otherwise, it's an ok game. Don't let the .99 cent cost fool you, that only gets you the single player campaign. To play the "memory" game you pay another .99 cents. To unlock the multiplayer game, it's another .99 cents. Motherfuckers. The singleplayer campaign is basically just a frog jumping from lilypad to lilypad, and they spin at different speeds. It's basically the quality of a flash game. Something you can find for free online probably. But it's got nice graphics, and it's fun to play on the touch screen. And it was a dollar. Two dollars if you include the muiltiplayer mode, which means there are random lilypads per match, and the object of the game is to jump onto the lillypad the other player is on, effectively eating him. When you get good at it, its actually pretty hectic, and I've found myself having fun with my fiancee despite playing it really just to keep her happy. The memory game is fun too, it's another dollar. Can you guess? You click lillypads to reveal the frog underneath and match similar frogs. It's good to waste time with.

Pic1, Pic2,Pic3.

9) Solitaire Classics: This is a high res version of Solitaire/FreeCell/Spider. I'm fucking talking about Solitaire. I know. Shoot me. But still, it's good to kill time, and I think it cost me nothing.

Pic1

10) Backgammon: Do you need a description? It works really well, though. Another product of fiancee pressure.

No pictures, sorry. Too lazy. You need a screenshot of Backgammon?

11) Fieldrunners: A high res tower defense clone. I don't like tower defense games, but if you do, this is one of the prettier ones I've seen, and plus the touch based system is very well suited as I've stated for this sort of game.

Didn't take photos because I don't like the game.

12) Asplosion: It gets more complex and more interesting, but basically you have to set off a chain reaction of explosions with various elements that have different explosion properties. I haven't gotten into extremely complex levels yet, but I can't tell if there's strategy or just luck involved, since so far I only get to set off the explosion, after that I'm just watching and hoping it turns out well. I'm assuming later on there's secondary interactions. Despite the mechanic seeming simple, it's actually a rather fun to play. The perfect chain reaction explosion? Who can not like.

Pic1, Pic2, Pic3.

13) Cod Zombies: FPS on the iPad works. I didn't believe it at first. I played some god awful Medal Of Honor game and I said to myself "what a load of shit." Then I got NOVA for the iPhone, just because I was curious. iPhone games btw run either in the original size or blown up 2x. Blown up they don't look terrible, but they aren't all that impressive. That game uses two virtual analog sticks on each side of the screen, with a semi-auto-lock system and a simple shooting mechanic. It works. I was amazed. Too bad the game sucked. Then they released Cod Zombies. Same idea. Two virtual analog sitcks. You can also just use one analog stick for movement and swipe the screen for aiming (not recommended). Turn on auto-aim to high. Do it. Lower the sensitivity of the aiming stick, and bam, you have fun. Also does coop up to 4 players, via bluetooth (???), local wifi, and internet. This is actually fun. It works. And the graphics are impressive for the device. People that see it always go "wait wtf? thats real time? hmm..." It's definitely Source, just tuned down. They should port HL1 over to this thing. HL2 probably would work too. I would love to see that. The downside is of course that you absolutely need some form of autoaim. Don't expect to enjoy it without it. In my opinion, they should use the lock on system from Metroid on the Wii. That would be -perfect-. I'm sure someone will figure that out soon and make some sweet FPS games. So yeah, believe it or not, FPS works. The screen is way large enough to fit for your thumbs on the analog sitcks, and to fire you just tap the right stick. You tap once and hold for automatic weapons. Reload with a button just above the right analog stick. There's also ironsight for headshots. It works, the graphics are good, the gameplay is fun. I was surprised.

Hot stuff:

Pic1, Pic2.

Ok, so whats the catch? Well, so far I only have 3 levels. Is that all there is? I don't know. I would seriously hope not considering it cost 15 fucking dollars. Im thinking I have to actually BEAT the second level to unlock the next ones, I don't think they could be that cruel to us. Nah, I take that last part back.

I would say "Get the NOVA demo on your iPhone and see what I mean" but on the iPhone it's too fucking small to work right. On the iPad you have enough screen real-estate to use the virtual analog sticks and other buttons properly. I know with just a tiny bit of consideration, people can make these things properly. Just look at the MGS game. It's the simplest mechanic, but it works really well, and it's a lot of fun, even though I'm just shooting at static, slightly animated sprites. I'm hoping Kojima will make something 3d that does things right to teach people what the fuck. Anywho, I'll stop talking about this. I just wanted to explain that FPSing actually works, and I'm as surprised as you are.

14) GT Racing: Finally, a smart racing game. I swear, people are in such a hurry to get their games out that no one is thinking about what they're developing. Every other racing game I've tried makes you tilt the device to accelerate. It's bad enough you have to rotate it to turn (which fucks with the orientation of the screen making you confused). This game does two things right. A) It uses the virtual buttons idea. Right side of the screen is the acceleration pedal. Left side is the break. It works. The physics aren't Grand Turismo, but they beat any Need For Speed game ever made. But that doesn't say a lot I guess. They even included some compensation for the orientation of the screen when you are turning. But it's not 1:1 and there's no reason why it can't be. These racing games should let you turn the wheel, while maintaing the screen flat, successfully making the iPad a steering wheel, and the racing game screen not screwing with your orientation. This is all possible. Soon as people get over trying to be the FIRST ON THE MARKET I'm sure the games will become better at this. But this game is playable. Good graphics, BUTTONS for throttle control, and compensation for the screen rotation, but not as much as I'd like.

Pic1, Pic2.

15) Red Alert: It's Red Alert, in 3d. RTS are -perfect- for this touch based input system but somehow this game is lame. It's probably just me though, it plays just like an RTS should, but I don't like it. I don't know why. It'll probably be most peoples favorite.

No pictures, never got into it.

16) Marblenauts: A puzzle game that's an advanced version of Pachinko or whatever.

Pic1

17) Jelly Defenders HD: It's Space Defender, but with cute jelly monsters parachuting in, and color oriented, so you need to use the right color munitions against the colored cute jelly monsters. Fun, cheap, why not.

Pic1,

18) Glow Hockey: It's Glow Hockey. Obviously this works on a touch based screen. Again, multiplayer modes up the ying yang.

Pic1

19) GodFinger: This is a big one. I don't actually play it. I watch my fiancee play. But it's a nice game. You watch your planet as a vivisection, and you have little people you have to play God for. You can carry them around and set them to do tasks, like Black and White. You have them Farm to produce food for each other, mine for gold, and create totem polls where they worship you for mana. You use mana to make it rain (by charging up rain clouds). The rain refreshes your people, and makes trees and flowers grow. Fruit trees can be picked for food. You can use thunderclouds to zap the undead that every once and a while decide to attack your people. The game has a lot to it, a lot of thought was put into it and it's very well done, but I can't tell you much because I don't play it. I'll include a bunch of screenshots though. What I like about this game is this: You can zoom in and out etc, but if you zoom out far enough from your planet, you see the planets neighboring yours. You can add people to your friends list and they will inhabit the planets near you. I don't know what interactivity this includes, if you can go summon volcanos and the undead on someone else's planet. I'm thinking that's the idea, but I'm assuming thats the point. Otherwise, what, you just visit their planet and watch? I don't think so, this game was well done enough so that they might have done the MP part properly. I also noticed something about setting certain friends as Neutral, furthering my belief that there's a competitive point to filling your galaxy with other peoples planets. Unfortunately no one wants to add my fiancee so (or she doesn't know how) so we haven't seen it in action. It's fun to watch her play though. It's fun to pinch to zoom around her planet, it's fun to grab her little fuckers an fling them across the face of the Earth. I like to make them starve and die from dehydration. You want rain? I make it rain way the fuck away from the village, and just grow a nice forest. Fuck the humans. I'm trying to harvest some undead fuckers.

This is one of many "plus+" games, which is a gaming network such as XBL or PSN. You can register for free and keep a buddylist that follows you through games. Wesnoth uses a similar gaming network, I forget its name, but it allows you to easily find someone to play a multiplayer skirmish with, send messages to eachother, etc. I made that bold so that people might notice this part, as it's a pretty cool system.

Pic1, Pic2, Pic3, Pic4,Pic5, Pic6.

20) Compression: It's Tetris. Does Tetris benefit from a touch based system? No, not really. Does it suffer? No, works fine. Moot.

No pictures. It's fucking Tetris.

21) Small World: Fuck, I remember this game being cool, but I don't remember why. Fuck it.

Don't even know what this game is.

22) Gravity HD: A ball or a rolling object comes out of a start point and you have to use materials to set up crazy complex systems in order to achieve the goal (which is usually to hit a red button to end the level. And no, you can't just spawn something over the button and make it fall on it. It has to be struck as result of the chain of events that take place.

Pic1,
Pic2,
Pic3.

I've got several other games but they're not worth mentioning since they're so mundane and are so standard (I included Solitaire because it's a pretty good Solitaire. Nice graphics and smooth. Whatever). For example I have Crosswords that gets its sources from various publications for free, I have "Game Table" which is a cheap ass game. It basically gives you a virtual version of the actual games. No logic applied. You can play Chess, Checkers, Reversi, Poker, etc etc etc. But you have to follow the rules. You have to move the pieces the way they move, you have to move defeated pieces off the table. I think I actually prefer it that way honestly. It just gives me the raw material, in a digital format, to play these games. Considering the price, it was good enough for me. I've got a Math game, which is strangely addictive, and one last game that I have to mention despite now typical it is:

Last one) Mahjongg 2 HD: It's Mahjongg. There's a demo, and then you pay like four bucks for the full thing. There are free versions that probably do the same shit. But I like this one, why? Because it is flashy. I'm embarrassed just to say that. But it just feels good. Matched tablets smack into each other and zoom off screen, some pieces have "pearls" embedded into them. You collect these pearls for some reason I don't know yet. But it's fun to find a good set of pearl pieces. Quickly finding 6 sets of duplicates with the animation and the effects is oddly satisfying. I don't know how to explain. Try the demo, and see what I mean. Then try the free one and tell me which one you prefer. No seriously, I'm curious! How fucked up am I?

Pic1

And for the curious, despite there being direct ways to upload photos to Facebook, I wanted them on my computer as well, so I used Dropbox, which is indispensable. I thought "meh" when I first heard of this app (it's Windows too), and once I started using it I realized how I cant live without it anymore. Much like the iPad... Give it a look, Dropbox.com. No matter where I am I have access to my files, and if I put something in my Public folder, I can copy the URL and share it with anyone. It works from Windows, OSX, iPhones, iPads, and I think Androids as well. Amazing app. Get it. Dropbox.com

Dropbox


Oh and not so much a game, as a learning tool: Fingerpiano. I used it as an analog to Synthesia. You can play right off the iPad (if you download it, go into settings and make the keys "large), or you can use it to guide you through the song as you play on your keyboard (iPad fits snugly in the music sheet rack.

Pic1 - This is an older screenshot, before I enabled the labeling of each key.


Meh, if you've made it this far, I might as well show you a few more things:

RDP, Documents To Go, awesome app. Don't let the name fool you. It's a complete Office Suite, it doesn't have as many tools as the 10 dollar Pages app, but you can create .doc files and .xls files, complete with functions and all. Dropbox integrates with it so I drop it onto my dropbox folder, then from my iPad I open with Documents To Go, and bam. I use this app more than pages. Oh, and typing? The widescreen keyboard is huge, in fact, I use my iPad in widescreen mode about 90% of the time. I rarely ever use "paper" mode, unless I'm reading a book, browsing Wiki (but not when I'm browsing the web), or using something like BBC's news app.

Another thing is how smooth certain apps are compared to their websites. The two I'm talking about are Craigslist (Don't get craigsphonehd, they came out with a new one, its in the top ten apps hard to miss) and Ebay. It's smoother and quicker than the website, and doesn't have any ads. I rather use the app than the site. Same situation with IMDB. The app just works better than the site. And it connects to my browser when necessary, including direct to Wiki and Email, etc.

I can type just fine with it on a desk, slightly tilted, using the widescreen keyboard, but if thats not good enough, this is what I set up if I'm typing a lot:

My desk at the office. Here's a close up of the iPad on a .99c card holder that works as a perfectly stable dock (can touch it and all), and the iMac bluetooth keyboard that I carry around with it. Using it at the moment as an ssh client. Just one of many applications. But that's it, I won't talk any more about the iPad itself, this thread is about iPad GAMING.

New games are coming out constantly. Anyone else have an iPad? Any suggestions? (Ten bucks says someone says "yeah use ur iPad as a coaster lol cuz Apple sux). Man, I feel like a tool. I'm sorry if my assumption about the negativity I'll receive seems melodramatic, it's just the internet (not even TTLG) has never failed to disappoint in being this way. There is more discussion, as a rule, about how much people dislike something or why something sucks, rather than constructive conversation between people who actually enjoy the topic. Hating is big business. Especially when it comes to something as Polarizing as Apple, or a device as ambiguous in nature as the iPad.

[Koki]

So can we just skip the "lol Macfag" shit or the "lol you taped 4 iPhones together didn'tya!"

Okay.

Wesnoth is horrible. The authors pridefully state they follow the KISS rule, as if making simplistic games was an achievement. Worse still, Wesnoth is (or tries to be) a strategy game. Result? Shit. Highlights include: one unit per hex; casters and ranged units having same range as melee units; support units not getting XP for actually supporting; broken XP system requiring lots of micromanagement of who gets the last blow; turn limits; combat system in which only thing that matters is terrain your unit is on; HP of units not having any impact on their combat abilities; unlimited counters; the previous three together, which means you might literally lose your entire army attacking one well positioned enemy unit.

[Malf]

Still not convinced with the iPad (plus Apple are taking the piss with the UK pricing), but I have been buying some nice iPhone games recently.
The three that stand out are Space Inveders Infinity Gene, Critter Crunch and Tilt to Live.

Infinity Gene's a fantastic shmup, but some of the more complex levels do suffer with a touch-screen interface, as you can end up covering your (tiny) ship or incoming bullets. Still highly recommended though. It rewards replays too, with your performance being added to a score bar at the end of the level. Fill up the bar and you get an "Evolution", which can be some artwork, music, a new weapon or a new level.

Critter Crunch is a puzzle game with a Studio Ghibli style, and is very, VERY compelling. There's some very interesting ideas in there, split between an adventure mode and the now seemingly compulsory puzzle mode. The basic idea is to eat smaller critters then spit them back at bigger ones so that the bigger guys eat them and then pop. Great attention to detail and plenty of depth means I can see myself wiling away many a train journey with this.

And Tilt to Live is a freebie anti-shmup, where you guide your asteroids-style ship by tilting the phone. You can only destroy stuff buy picking up the various power-ups littered about the screen.
It gets silly-hard very quickly, but is great fun.

[The Alchemist]

Okay.

Wesnoth is horrible. The authors pridefully state they follow the KISS rule, as if making simplistic games was an achievement. Worse still, Wesnoth is (or tries to be) a strategy game. Result? Shit. Highlights include: one unit per hex; casters and ranged units having same range as melee units; support units not getting XP for actually supporting; broken XP system requiring lots of micromanagement of who gets the last blow; turn limits; combat system in which only thing that matters is terrain your unit is on; HP of units not having any impact on their combat abilities; unlimited counters; the previous three together, which means you might literally lose your entire army attacking one well positioned enemy unit.

Hmm, well the benefit of ranged attacks is that they can't be countered. And more HP means the more you can tank, plus the more you regain during the night when in a fort. I don't know about support units nit getting xp but it wouldn't be the first game to make that mistake so I wouldn't be surprised. One unit per hex makes sense, what are you proposing? And I can't say I've deliberately ever tried to level a character so I dont know shit about how frustrating it is to attempt this although it also sounds asinine. Also besides the terrain there is always a weakness and strength to a character to be exploited by the proper unit. Are we playing the same game? No, seriously. Thank for talking about the game and not the platform though.

[dethtoll]

Taped 4 iPhones together? Cross your arms all you want, that's hilarious.

[The Alchemist]

Taped 4 iPhones together? Cross your arms all you want, that's hilarious.

Yeah I laugh at that myself... I sometimes walk around with the iPad against my face as if it were a phone going "hello??? I can't hear you! How do you make calls on this bloody thing?" No seriously, I do that.

[dethtoll]

I do not doubt.

[henke]

Good write-up Alchy. I do not have an iPad nor do I ever intend to get one but it's nice to see what it's capable of, games-wise.

[lost_soul]

Well, I've yet to do any gaming on a touch-screen device, but my cousin is sending me his old Nokia N770. I plan to try and play Doom on it and use it for other things as well. Seems like it would get uncomfortable gaming on a device that wasn't engineered for that.

[Shadowcat]

Hey, it turns out that Oasis is available for the iPad!

If you've never played the PC version, it's a really beautifully-balanced quick-to-play turn-based strategy game, with semi-random level generation which will keep you coming back to it over and over again.

Individual levels take just a few minutes to play through, but combine together into longer campaigns, and each of the campaigns brings its own unique twists.

All this means that you can consume it in anything from bite-sized chunks to a full banquet. And just when you think you're done, you realise that you are ready for the next difficulty level, and the challenge begins anew.

Mahk and Andrew give a good description of the game in this interview:
http://www.gametunnel.com/oasis-developer-interview.php

In the past I described it as:

Definitely one of the finest independent games I've played. One of the ones that is easily worth every cent. I just wish that the demo version conveyed its full brilliance -- it took me ages to actually buy it, because I felt like I'd pretty much seen everything by the time I'd finished the demo. An absurd and laughable impression in retrospect, but it makes me wonder if they could have done a bit more with the demo.

I guess the problem is that it's the balance and pretty-much perfect learning curve on the difficulty levels that gives the game its impressive staying power, and that's hard to convey in a short span of time.

[henke]

I do not have an iPad nor do I ever intend to get one

Haha oh how 6 months can change your perspective. I'm actually fairly determined to get some kind of tablet next summer. But I'm not sure whether it'll be an iPad, iPad2, Galaxy Tab, or some other kind yet. I guess the main thing keeping me from settling on an iPad is the lack of Flash. It just seems like a lot of online functionality would be missing without it(youtube and all). What do you people who already have iPad's say? Do you miss Flash at all?

[addink]

The iOS webbrowser recognizes embedded youtube objects and converts them into a link that'll play the video in a separate youtube app. But Apple's refusal to support Flash on iDevices is indeed rather annoying ...and petty.

The official reasons, 'performance issues' and 'stability issues' (true or not), can both be dealt within the iOS itself (defining a ceiling on CPU use and sandboxing the plugin). Apple conveniently chooses not to seek a solution.. this, of course, has nothing to do with the fact that supporting Flash could seriously hurt sales in the appstore. They are a decent company that only serves their customers' best interest, of course.

Regardless of the lack of Flash within the browser I'm still very happy with my iPhone, and have been thinking about an iPad; Within a week or so there should be yet another Apple event *cough*infomercial*cough* regarding the 'revolution' that will be the iPad2. I'll wait and see what they've got up their sleeve.

[gunsmoke]

The radio interview I heard today said not to expect them to reinvent the wheel, but just minor refinements/additions. It was with PCmag.com (PC Magazine's editor-in-chief).

I, myself, am going to get one of those $49 At&t iPhones that they are fire sale-ing since the Verizon phone shipped last month. I could REALLY use that sucker for work. My netbook is nice, but I am mostly using it for email and minor web browsing (our company's web site for planograms) and something I could slip into my shirt pocket would be much more favorable when I am in retail store. I hate having to keep one eye on my netbook when doing a reset. I travel a lot, and may visit 6 stores a day to check on my employees. The less I have to lug around, the better.

[Renzatic]

Yeah. Everything I've seen points towards it being a little thinner, a little lighter, a set of better speakers, and maybe dual core processor/ram bump. Pretty much what you'd expect from a hardware update.

Right now, I'd say the Motorola Xoom is the most interesting tablet coming out in the near future. It has the best hardware of the bunch, and still manages to sport 8-9 hours of battery life. And as an added bonus, the very Chrome like browser on the thing actually honest to god supports Flash (or will in a couple of weeks). If it weren't for the $800 price tag, it'd be the one I'd recommend getting above all else.

[Yakoob]

Addink - see my main reason for not getting an iPad is that its an apple product. I'm not a rabid windows or linux fanboy, but I despise Apple and their practices (as reflected by their refusal for flash support and generally keeping thier users as far away from controlling their devices as possible).

Other reasons include the fact that it's way overpriced compared to its realistic cost and doesn't really bring anything new to the table (for me). If I wanted a portable gamging device, iPad is too big and bulky, and my DS has plenty of games to keep me busy (not that I use it much). If I wanted a mini-laptop, well... I already have a laptop (that has a keyboard) so no need for that.

That being said, I do acknowledge that the iPad is nice for casual web browsing in the living room and the big touch-screen is an excellent choice for some types of games. If I had one for free I'd probably use it

[henke]

Other reasons include the fact that it's way overpriced compared to its realistic cost

Odd to hear you say that. I read this Wired article which paints a picture of the iPad as being the most price-worthy tablet right now.

[gunsmoke]

The iPad is not over-priced. It is cheap, and for Apple that is surprising. It cost roughly the same as a cheap laptop.

I used my neighbor's iPad for a week when he went on a fishing trip. One thing I really liked was laying back on the couch and surfing the web. Much more comfortable than using a net/notebook in the same position. Also, he has AppleTV, and can beam (I believe through Wi_Fi, but maybe it is Bluetooth) video from his iPad to his 48" HDTV. We watched a movie that way in HD and it was great. He said the newer iPhones can do the same thing.

[Yakoob]

Ah, I stand corrected then. Thanks for clearing that up!

However, as far as I know, most of other apple products (particularly their laptops) are in fact overpriced. They are good laptops, no doubt about it, but they're not that good. Even a few of my friends who are mac fans admit to that.

[lost_soul]

I myself have been wondering how well a device with only a touch screen works for FPS games. I just want a handheld version of DooM that doesn't suck and can play PWADs. A friend gave me one of the Nokia 770s, but gaming isn't so comfortable on it.

Perhaps the situation is different with an Ipad, because it is bigger and you can use your fingers to control the game, rather than a pointing stick. The only problem that I see is; when you hold these devices, your eight fingers are usually on the back. Your thumbs are on the front and you have less ability to hit lots of buttons quickly. I would like to try DooM on an Ipad device for an hour or so to see how it would work.

[Renzatic]

Even a few of my friends who are mac fans admit to that.

I'm surprised they didn't look at you with their dead eyed glazed over stare, and say "it just works".

Actually, the 13 inch Macbook line aren't too terribly overpriced in comparison to their PC counterparts. Specially this recent rev of Macbook Pros. Anemic graphics card aside(256MB? Really?), they're sporting some fairly decent hardware. For $1200, they're just about competitive with the other top tier luxury laptops.

It's when you get into the 15-17 inch that things start getting ridiculous. I'm interested in the two 15 inch Pro models, and it seems my only choice is to have a shitty graphics card and a great processor for expensive, or a slightly better processor and a fairly decent graphics card for ridiculously overpriced. I mean comeon. A Radeon HD 6750M with a gig of video ram doesn't cost $300 more than a 6490M with 256 megs.

And to make things even more ridiculous, I saw this when I went to customize my new Mac...



$250 for 100Mhz? COMEON! It's not even a bump up to a newer generation processor. They're both Sandy Bridge i7s.

I'll admit that Macs are great computers that'll give you less hassle and more battery power overall in comparison to an equivalent Windows laptop. But Apple bends you over and fucks you lubeless on the price. No doubt about it.

[lost_soul]

My brother and his wife have Macbooks. They seem like nice machines. Even something like the Asus G50V is plenty powerful enough for me. We just need battery life that doesn't suck. I had to laugh at the Mac desktops for sale on Best Buy.com though. $1600 for a core I3 with 4 gigs of ram? bwahaha

I'm certainly no Apple hater, in fact I want their market share to increase to around 45%. Maybe then PC users won't be charged $200 for a bloated pig of an OS that is bound to stop working some day.

[Renzatic]

I'd say I am beginning to get kinda weary of Apple as of late. When you consider how controlling and belligerent they are as a company, and add in all the bullshit they've been pulling over on developers through the app store recently, they've been making it easy for alot of people to get annoyed at them.

Right now, saying you'd like to see them take up 45% of the PC market is like saying you're getting sick of just having the Democrats and Republicans around, and want to mix in the Khmer Rouge to shake the status quo up a bit.

[addink]

I would like to try DooM on an Ipad device for an hour or so to see how it would work.

It's not that great. The controls do work but they are nowhere near the feel of mouse and keyboard. This is quite obvious from the wide range of interface layouts the iOS doom allows for: None of them feel right, but the option is there to change them so complaining is discouraged. Seriously, within an hour you won't be able to really try all the variations in layout. It even allows you to drag the buttons around to customize the layout.

But I should point out that iOS Doom is a somewhat dated FPS in terms of interface. Other shooters like Gameloft's Nova and Modern Combat feature a more comfortable drag-view-to-aim setup which, though better, still isn't comparable with the control you get from mouselook.

Another serious problem with the handheld touchscreen FPS's is that having two thumbs just isn't enough to control a full 3D environment. One thumb to move, one thumb to aim, and then.. how do you shoot? You have to stop moving or stop aiming to fire. The word 'immersive' isn't really applicable.

Perhaps if they make the backs of future iDevices touch sensitive too, getting some virtual buttons right where the rest of your fingertips are idling. This would allow for a more fluent interaction. I doubt this will ever happen, tough. The devices purposely seem to be designed for easy interaction, two sided touch interfaces just don't seem to classify as such.

[henke]

I do not have an iPad nor do I ever intend to get one

STATUS UPDATE: I have ordered an iPad.

It's an iPad 1 32GB Wifi. Got it for a mere threehundredninetynine of my Eurobucks. It's due to arrive on Monday or Tuesday. If it comes any later than that I am fairly certain I will be falling to pieces waiting for the damn thing. I've already got the eagerly-awaiting-shiny-new-thing-jitters. I can't sleep. And to make things worse for myself I can't help but surf youtube looking at videos of games and apps I need to get for this thing once I get this thing.

SHOPPINGLIST:
GTA Chinatown Wars duh
Djay - I must have watched this video 10 times now. That shit just looks AMAZING
GarageBand - looks fun and I know a lot of musicians so it will serve as an excellent show-off-thingy. AND WHO KNOWS MAYBE ILL FINALLY WRITE MY MASTERPIECE
Superbrothers - looks fantastic and with a trailer like that there's no "not buying it" is there?
Inifity Blade? - is this really as good as they say it is because the gameplay videos haven't really impressed me.
Mad Skills Motocross or Reckless Racing maybe. Haven't been able to make my mind up which one has the GNARLIER title yet.
Osmos
Adobe's free drawing thing
Angry Birds probably
Maybe that cheap pinball game
Free games: Harbor Master, Stick Golf, Labyrinth and Airhockey
maybe Sim City or C&C or some other strategygame/rts
Some eReader software because this thing isn't just a TOY you know it's a serious piece of machinery.
that app that makes it look like theres beer in your iPad and then you tip it sideways into your mouth and its kinda like youre drinking the beer haha!
And I'm probably going to have to get Mexican Immigration Simulator Smuggle Truck.

What am I missing?

[entertainer]

What am I missing?

a black dildo