Lunchtime Discussion: Apple

People may try and pretend that Apple have no impact on the gaming market, but the simple fact is that the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch have significantly changed the scope of mobile gaming. I will happily concede that their desktop and laptop offerings aren’t exactly powerhouses in the gaming world, but Apple have quickly become big players in the mobile space.

Gaming on mobile phones was always going to continue to grow and would eventually have become a far bigger part of our gaming life. However Apple’s entry into that area with the iPhone and its associated App Store caused the segment of the market to explode almost over night, and now gaming on smart phones is very big business. This has some people asking the question ‘what next?’.

With the recent announcement of OS 4.0 and the addition of the Game Center system, which seems to be akin to the other systems like Xbox Live and the PSN, makes it very clear that Apple certainly have further ambitions in gaming. With the audience they’ve got in the mobile market it makes sense for them to build the system exclusively for those platforms, but it also builds them a very solid base if they try and expand their presence further.

With Apple TV, and even the Mac Mini, it’s clear that Apple want a presence under your TV, just like Microsoft did when they launched the Xbox. The question is do they want to move on from that to having a dedicated gaming console? Every so often some very, very vague rumours surface about some kind of AppleBox appearing in the distant future, and to be honest Apple are one of the most obvious entrants into the home console market.

Will it ever happen? Well that’s probably a question for you lovely readers to answer. Will Apple get into the home console market, expanding Game Center? Or will they stay a strictly mobile operation? Either way will they force Nintendo and Sony out of the mobile space?

Thanks to Adam for suggesting this topic via Twitter. Got an idea you’d like to see discussed? Why not suggest it?