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“I absolutely fucking hate the iPhone App Store,” declared indie developer Tommy Refenes during his segment of the Indie Game Makers Rant at Game Developers Conference in San Francisco this week.
Refenes, known for his work on Goo! and the upcoming Super Meat Boy, has philosophical objections to Apple’s mobile digital distribution platform. “The majority of people who do anything for the App Store work on it and then kind of get screwed over,” he said.
The App Store “is the Tiger handheld game of this generation,” Refenes explained. Just like low-quality LCD-based handheld games, the true successes of the App Store seem to be translations of established franchises and brand names that present severely downgraded versions of their original experiences. He pointed to less-playable iPhone versions of Assassin’s Creed, Sonic the Hedgehog, Mega Man 2, and Street Fighter IV as examples.
After all, as Playfish co-founder Kristian Segerstrale observed during GDC, seven of the eight best-selling App Store games last year were mobile versions of existing major game franchises.
“It’s just a way to sell a brand,” Refenes said. “That’s what the Tiger handheld games were, and that’s what I think the App Store is.”
But Refenes’ rant wasn’t limited to a debatable analogy. He came equipped with a personal experience that further confirmed his impression of the App Store as a place where traditional correlations of quality have little meaning.
“About five months I started an experiment, and the experiment was basically to prove the App Store is kind of shit for most things,” he said.
Along with fellow prolific indie developer Adam Saltsman (Canabalt, Wurdle), Refenes developed a “joke game” for iPhone titled Zits & Giggles, consisting mainly of popping virtual pimples.
Like so many other iPhone games, Zits & Giggles launched at $0.99. Sales were never remarkable, and they eventually tapered off entirely. But rather than pursue a traditional marketing strategy like offering the game for free for a limited time, Refenes did just the opposite: he raised the price to $15, exorbitant by iPhone standards.
Shockingly, “the day I put it up to $15, three people bought it,” Refenes said.
“So,” he continued, “I said, ‘I’m going to put it up to $50.’ Four people bought it.”
After observing that fortuitous trend, Refenes decided to test its resilience by boosting the game’s selling price every time at least one copy was sold.
“I stopped paying attention to it for a while,” he recalled, then “I checked it on Valentine’s Day, and 14 people bought it at $299.”
The game has now reached a price tag of $350.
Based only on Refenes’ sales figures for a limited number of the game’s many price tiers, Zits & Giggles generated at least $4,431 at the $15, $50, and $299 price points alone. It currently holds an App Store customer rating of two and a half stars out of five, with only two written reviews, one of which reads in its entirety, “It’s hilarious.” (Its official description still claims it costs “a FRIGGIN DOLLAR.”)
“My conclusion to all of this,” Refenes said, “is that the people who you’re selling to on the App Store are not necessarily gamers.”
[This news item was written by Chris Remo and originally appeared at FingerGaming sister site Gamasutra.]
What a troll.
ridiculous.
AC2 on Iphone is the same version than the DS game, and far better than the PSP version (yes, the game is better graphically, but is a crap on all the other aspects)
GTA is the same then the DS or PSP version
SF4 is a good game on Iphone, with top graphics
Settlers on Iphone is by far the best portable version
Rolando 2, or Edge, or Toki tori or Soosiz, or Gomi or Doodle Jump or Peggle or Zen bound, or Spin and a lot of games are gems.
So, what else ?
12 morrons bought a crap game at 300 dollars and he says that all the guy on Iphone are dumb and not players ?
Is he totally fool ?
The App Store description still claims it costs “a FRIGGIN DOLLAR” and Tommy Refenes’s website has no contact information (or any text besides the page title).
So, basically, Tommy is bragging about running a scam?
[...] It seems that, perhaps not so surprisingly, Phase 2 is “charge $299 and up for joke apps”. No, seriously. [...]
[...] en een gemiddelde waardering van 2,5 sterren blijkt deze flutgame nog steeds goed te lopen. De les die Refenes eruit heeft geleerd is dat mensen die naar de App Store komen niet allemaal gamers zijn. De [...]
I can’t believe they didn’t realize they just fooled people into thinking the app was $2.99 rather than $299, especially since more people bought it at that price than at $50, where they probably thought the app was actually $5.
And the argument that there’s nothing but crap on the App Store is obviously false, as Akira proved. Just look at the weekly top-10 charts, there are generally more indie titles than franchise titles.
That’s a little disheartening to here that from an indie developer. I’m just beginning in game design myself and think that the iPhone is an excellent platform for indies. Look at the insane success of a title such as Doodle Jump. Extremely simple concept and very fun. Two iPhone projects I’m working on not only work well with the iPhone, but it’s as if they were meant for it. One of them is an old concept inspired by an even older game, but for a platform would only ever be so so on a desktop. The iPhone however – utilizing tilt control is perfect for it. It’s just popularity and success depend on both quality of the game and how well you market it.
The app store is a godsend for indies. It’s another platform but also a very simple and much more hassle free way to make profit as compared with other older profit models. Of course just as any platform, unless it’s closed and commercial, you will get lots of developers releasing crap. But, there are sites like these that find the gems. The only reason that iPhone versions of popular commercial games make money, is the fact that they have a large fanbase and a lot of fans will put up with downgraded quality and controls. I mean, Mega Man 2. Come on, who wouldn’t want to have that in their pocket?
[...] after developer Tommy Refenes publicly lambasted the iTunes App Store for its lack of quality, Apple has removed Refenes’ novelty game Zits [...]
[...] But I recently ran across a fascinating item on FingerGaming.com (via slashdot) about a developer’s experiences selling games on Apple’s App Store. [...]
Akira, congratulations on managing to prove that even the iPhone users that ARE gamers are dumb.
I have no doubt that many of the iPhone versions of games are very good versions with great visuals, but the iPhone is never going to have the responsiveness or accuracy of a real controller. Puzzle games, strategy games or gimmicky games like “Zits and Giggles” work fine but games that require split second timing and accuracy (like SF4) are never going to be a viable on the iPhone. Leave them on hand-held devices that can cope.
Akira, congratulations on managing to prove that even the iPhone users that ARE gamers are dumb by being unable to spell “morons” — there is a certain irony about someone calling someone else a “moron” and then misspelling it — also if you are going to rant on an English-speaking forum, at least get someone to check your use of the language… “Are you totally fool??”
The result of this experiment is further evidence that enough iphone owners are fucking stupid with more money than sense. No wonder Jobbo can tell them what they can do with the device they paid for, so long as they remain convinced of their own smug superiority compared to everyone else. Think different? Nah, theres no thinking going on at all in some of their heads.
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