http://i.imgur.com/o8PWx0p.png
The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus look fantastic, but with them come some issues for mobile games on Apple's platform. This comes from the fact that developers can no longer target a general device form factor. The iPhone has many games that play in portrait mode, including some of my favorites, but those will be harder to play on a larger phone where you can't comfortably reach the whole screen with your thumb when playing with one hand.

Due to the widely varying screen sizes in Android land, this has been the case with Android for a while now. Portrait games are few and far between on the Play store, but they're fairly popular on Apple's App Store.

Ultimately, this is unavoidable since the market clearly shows a demand for these larger phones, but whenever I upgrade next I'm going to miss having that small, comfortable phone.

Source: http://www.polygon.com/2014/9/9/6127383/iphone-6-apple-game-development

jdodson   Admin wrote on 09/14/2014 at 07:45pm

After watching the video I am pretty stoked about the new set of iPhones and Apple Watch. That said, more than likely, I won't be picking either one up but I am really happy to see the direction Apple is headed.

iPhone 6: It seems most people like bigger phones and Apple is giving people what they want. Personally, I really enjoy the form factor of my iPhone 5S but a bit larger phone wouldn't be a problem. It would be slightly inconvenient in that I will have a larger indentation in my pocket with a bigger phone, but that's not a huge deal. I use my smartphone for a ton of stuff and have up to this point avoided getting a tablet because I just use my phone for everything. That said, a bigger phone would be even less of a reason to buy a tablet.

I am curious if the 5S form factor is now totally gone or if the iPhone 7 will feature 3 different screen sizes?

About people having a hard time making games it seems to me that people can target Android devices and whereas having one size makes things easier, it seems developers are doing fine. There are a zillion different screen resolutions on PC and it seems people have dealt with that even though it does complicate things some. Since I like diversity in devices, I see the new Apple phones adding to that.

Travis, when you upgrade are you going (size wise) 6 or 6 plus? The next time I will have the chance to upgrade will be around the 6S if I keep to my current carrier upgrade path.

Oh and I love the fact that the storage is 16G, 64G and 128G!

Travis   Admin   Post Author wrote on 09/15/2014 at 02:38am

I'll also be upgrading around the 6S timeframe. No way am I going plus, that is just too big. The few portrait games I've tried to play on my Galaxy S4 (work phone) have been pretty bad unless I use two hands, and I use one hand for my shopping list app all the time. I'm a little bummed that the 5/5S form factor is going away. Jobs mandated early on that you should easily be able to touch the whole screen with your thumb on which ever hand you were using, and I wish they'd at least kept that option around.

jdodson   Admin wrote on 09/15/2014 at 02:36pm

They may but it seems likely that we will have only the two sizes going forward.

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