So over the last couple weeks there has been a ton of info that came out of the Bioware Guild Summit for SWTOR Patch 1.2. Which I did a quick post on a little while ago. Also the Mists of Pandaria Press event happened last week which gave us a lot of great info about the upcoming expansion. GamebreakerTV is all over that. With all the daily videos that cover everything and a two and a half hour episode of Legendary, their coverage is much more than I could accomplish all on my own. So be sure to head over there for an information overload. Very excited for MoP and SWTOR patch 1.2. Be sure to check them out. Also, in case you’ve been living under a rock Diablo 3 has a release date. May 15th. Very excited.
Moving along.
What I wanted to hit on today is the current age of portable gaming. How accessible it is and how many people that aren’t really much into gaming who take part. What got me thinking about it was a night after work a week or so ago. A few of us sat around the bar when we were finished just hanging out and playing Family Feud on Iphone. Of the five of us there, only 3 of us were gamers. The other two never really did much gaming or any gaming at all really.
Portable gaming has been around for some time now. Going all the way back to Nintendo Gameboy or Sega Game Gear we have had great portable gaming options. Over the years the major console gaming companies have released plenty of great options to play games on the go. Numerous iterations of the PSP and Nintendo DS have been the most common ones for years. Those handhelds still cater more to the gamer community than the general population.
Nowadays with the age of the smartphones it’s brought a new light to portable games. The ability to download all kinds of genres at your fingertips onto an Iphone/Ipad or on the Android marketplace has really opened some really great and cool gaming options to people who may not own a console or other means of handheld games.
Some people that I know don’t own any consoles. Have never really been gamers. Regardless, every day they hop on that Iphone and dig into some Fruit Ninja or Angry Birds or some other fun little smartphone game. A lot of people these days have a smartphone and these simple little games give people something to do while on a bus or in a waiting room or whatever. It’s very simple and accessible for so many people. It’s brought all kinds of gaming genres to people who don’t normally play games.
I think that this is a really great thing for gaming in general. I am a fan of all types of games. I play games on PC, both consoles, PSP and even pick up my Android and play around with it from time to time. Having people who don’t typically play games having fun accessible options available is really cool. To see people who don’t typically game chirping one another over high scores on Jetpack Joyride is pretty funny.
It’s a much more casual gaming space but more people playing more games is just good for the overall gaming community. I think it’s cool.
What portable games do you play? What platform are you using? PSP? DS? Smartphone? Regardless of what game or platform you rock out on, thanks for reading. GG
-FMG-
thefullmetalgamer 