One of the interesting things about Arkham City is the $3 iPad app that lets you know where Riddler Trophies are. Collectibles are an interesting topic and there are a lot of great essays covering what makes for good and bad collectibles, but what’s interesting about Arkham City and the companion app is the gaping hole between games and their companion pieces.
Arkham City Map App
Written by:zach
I believe the Scrabble app for the iPad allows players to use their iPhones or iPod Touches as the tile trays for turn based play in the same room.
I think Blizzard has come closest, with their auction house app. Most AAA games (well, most games in general) are a single game made of dozens of other smaller games. There's the gear optimization math, the PvP game, the PvP metagame, the crafting game, the auction house game, etc. Some of these games only make sense on a console/computer, but others—like the AH and crafting—are playable from a mobile device.
Transmedia at the moment is a series of interconnected but entirely separate experiences, but apps like this are predicting a future in which all the different parts are connected to one single game (or something).
Thanks, Zach! Helpful post; I cited you at a mobile app RIG meeting today. 🙂
sorry for the delay in response, illness knocked me the eff out.
@b18215a1e2d69193f45e85437da5324b yeah my understanding of the Scrabble thing was it fell victim to the Crystal Chronicles issue – having an exact number of people who want to play the game and ALSO who all have iphones is not an easy thing. At least in a 1:1 console:phone setting it's easier to organize. For one:many console:phone it's basically a hard requirement to support the different smartphone OS's.
Andrew VandenBossche yes yes yes . and i think the limitations of the phone dictate pretty seriously what minigames can be played on a mobile device as opposed to a console screen, but the DS has been pretty instructive as to what works on a second screen (maps! equipment!) and what doesn't (triggering powerups)
@47ad46ddb34784446262cdc55b6bbf4d thanks! …what's RIG? 😀
A really interesting idea that would work so well for a lot of things. Think of even tighter integration, exporting mini maps to phones/tablets would be a really interesting use.