While not the first mobile phone with touchscreen on the market, iPhone revolutionize the smartphone market and its rivals, Nokia, Samsung, HTC, Sony, etc followed as well and the button-based mobile phones went extinct after that. Most interestingly its ability to download countless of games and other applications in its stores, as long as the phone's hard disk space permits them. Like it or not smartphones changed our lives in less than a decade ago. Almost all of us have at least have one of them. We can watch our favorite movies and TV shows on the go. Kids can watch their favorite cartoons anytime, anywhere they wanted as long as their parents allowed them to. In fact it could be one of major reason behind the demise of Saturday morning cartoon slots. In this article I'm going to cover the issues behind smartphone games and its grim future to video game industry itself.
Children are easy targets
Perhaps the true target audiences of smartphone games are children under 12. Unlike the earlier generations including us they never grown up with PCs and consoles but rather with smartphones and tablets which both pretty much the same thing. While we might remember when we were kids and want to buy some new games in the local game stores, we usually accompanied by our parents or guardians or older siblings to do most of the business for us but with smartphones and something like game store applications conveniently bypass all of that. Today's kids can download as many games they wants without need to ask their parents or guardians first. All they need are smartphone itself and fast internet connection. Since most of the games are free to download and their parents or guardians aren't alerted until microtransactions were made. Most of the games are usually based on their favorite comic book or cartoon characters such as DC and Marvel superheroes, Disney, Naruto, Despicable Me etc. Most of those games usually have some sort of limitations on how many time you can play them in a day and it is a good way to tell its players, usually children to stop playing and go to school or bed or do their homework etc. Unfortunately this also creates a huge problem when they run out of in-game energy when less than hour worth of free time left before school or bed. Some of them may stole their parents' credit cards just to keep on playing. In fact some games such as Candy Crush have been accused of forcing players to buy extra energy in order to advance. Unfortunately there still too many unscrupulous publishers and developers using this tactic and somehow got away with it pretty often. Children are in fact easy targets for them.
They are also targeting adults as well
The smartphone game publishers and developers are also targeting adults as well. They probably start with housewives and office ladies. Why? Because housewives have lots of free time compared to most other people and office ladies are constantly on to move, bringing their phones wherever they go. The games that these people usually played are simple puzzle and memory games, hidden objects, something based on their favorite celebrities such as Kim Kardashian and Taylor Swift for examples and otome visual novels, which is popular among Asian women. As adults they already have money of their own and no need to ask for permission to make some in-game microtransactions. In the end these people probably spent more money than average "hardcore" gamer do in a month. No wonder why the publishers and developers loved grown women more than children, in sucking out their money of course. Those publishers also target grown men as well with their pornographic games. Take Nutaku for example which become the main provider for such games and what games they did offer? Clash of Clans clone with porn, Advance Wars/Fire Emblem clone with porn, Super Robot Wars clone with porn, tower defense game with porn and the list could go on.
My real issues with smartphone games
Smartphone games are much like junk food. They usually mass-produced, highly addictive, too little lasting values and disappears rather quickly. The most infuriating of them all is how they "encourage" you to buy overpriced in-game items in order to prevent you from being bullied by other players. By buying their overpowered armor and weapon at ridiculous prices you can be a bully yourself. Majority of those games usually don't have long lifespan. Imagine how much your money lost when your favorite games were shut down by their own developers after several years playing them. Smartphones, like PCs, are not subject of censorship and it only matters of time before some far-right racist screwnuts start making their own version of Hatred on smartphones and some numbskulls with severe addiction to yandere fetishes to make their own version of Yandere Simulator on the smartphones(again). Of course some well-crafted smartphone games made by more trusted developers do exists but unfortunately they are usually drowned in the sea of crappy free-to-download "games" that constantly asking you to make microtransactions in any available opportunity.
The grim future of video game industry as whole
What happened if smartphone games took over the industry and destroyed others in process? Sony probably stopped making consoles and video games and back to manufacture non-gaming electronic appliances and their own brand of smartphones. Microsoft also stopped making video games and consoles, probably focusing on making newer Windows operating systems. Nintendo were demoted from first party console manufacture into third party developer and publisher for smartphone games, just like its old enemy Sega in early 2000s. The PC gaming may still exists but only limited to some indie developers with their home-brewed games, constantly exchanging them on the internet. Steam, Origin and UPlay probably no longer exists as their companies, Valve, Electronic Arts, Ubisoft respectively are already out of their business. Smartphones reign supreme as no more competition from other gaming platforms and people continue to pour money to the publishers. A sad world for those who aren't into smartphone games like myself.
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