Notch about mobile gaming

This made me chuckle a bit.



The few times I've downloaded a mobile game, I've been left disappointed - to the point where I don't download any mobile games any more. Particularly not when game devs insist on installing ad and spywar on my phone.

Why is Notch wrong?
Or why is he right?

 

What does he even mean by "save mobile gaming"?

What is wrong with it currently?

The cash shops and pay to win stuff? If that is the case, then I definitely agree we need change. That stuff bleeds people dry and takes advantage of people with compulsions or addictive personality types. It's immoral. But if he isn't talking about that, then I probably think he's more than just wrong- he could very well be outright stupid. Let me explain.

I am always skeptical of the typical "Back in my day..." and "Things used to be better. Kids these days..." or "Society these days is..."
Because they are always wrong. Dead wrong.

edit: This example is about the mindset of this type of thinking. The actual example (degrading morals in society) is entirely irrelevant.
A prime example are all the mindless older people who constantly say "Back in my day, we had morals and values. Communities cared for each other, and the family unit was stronger."
That is irrational nonsense. We are actually more tolerant as a society today than we have ever been. Murder rates have gone DOWN. Communities still care for each other, and the family unit is still strong. Usually the only thing that changed is that white supremacy has lowered and society is less 'white' than it used to be. People who suffer from living in a bubble of white privilege usually think their world is crumbling when in fact it's perfectly fine. In fact, the family unit is probably stronger since kids are staying at home longer or are boomeranging back to their parents into their 30's. The harsher 'economy' binds families together more. There are increases in immigrants- immigrants who have stronger family values and tighter knitting families than white culture does.

Things are changing some, but for the most part society, values, and how things are haven't changed since the dawn of man. People just don't think about it and are too lazy to actually contemplate beyond the appearance of change to realize it's not change, it's just slightly different on the surface.
Ironic, because the change is actually usually good, despite being perceived as bad. For example those who claim society is getting worse and more immoral because of "end of days" nonsense. Society is getting MORE tolerant. You're actually allowed to be openly gay in our culture, or a minority skin color, without being hanged to death by white supremacists. Yes, racism and intolerance still thrive, but it's getting better as each year passes. Especially among young people, who harbor significantly less racism and intolerance.



So forgive me if I'm skeptical as to what these people are talking about, "mindless games kids these days are playing!" or "we need a hero". A hero from what exactly? What does that even MEAN that "Kids are growing up being used to "this". What is THIS? And wtf...the kids are getting used to it intentionally????

Give me more information, or I will simply write them off as crazy old cooks who don't use their brain to actually think for themselves.

 

Another more relevant example, are MMORPG doomsayers and promoters of early PC gaming.

"Back in my day, MMORPG's were amazing. They had real communities. Strong playerbase. Developers who actually cared."

Now, some of this is actually true. In fact, I'd say a good amount of it might be.
However, it wasn't because the MMORPG's were better. It was because MMO's were brand spanking new. There were many reasons.


But if it's anything like what I think he is upset about, then he (and everyone else) is right about the horrible result of F2P P2W "buy energy" games which corporations use to leech money from people.

Even if he is right, the whole "Kids kids kids. Man, kids these days..." perspective and statements reveal the "Back in my day..." stupidity I talked about above.

They are probably just wrong about the focus on kids and "kids are used to it now" crap. How does he know what every kid in the modern world is like? He doesn't. Research Articles, or STFU about blaming kids or kids' parents, notch. Blame the greedy sicko's who develop these games, or the corporations which bleed you dry. I also find it ironic he is complaining and then says "I am lazy, so I'm not doing anything about it."

If you have all this money that you don't even know what to do with it, and you admit to sitting on your ass all day being lazy... and then you complain society (gaming) is crumbling around you...just wow. Just stfu already or do something about it. The only thing more disgusting than the corporations and people who develop these parasitic titles, are the people who can do something about it- but decide to be apathetic armchair heroes instead. Why not start an organization to get the word out? Pay for some advertising to get the word out that these types of games are bad for everyone. People who are informed, are less likely to waste their money.

Why not hire dev teams to get down and dirty? You have the money, so start researching what is being made. Release an identical game at the same time, but without the dirty tricks. Hit them where it hurts the most- in the balls of their wallet.


For mobile gaming abuse by corporations...
This is perhaps one of the worst cases:

I just hope no one is actually blaming the kids for this.

 

I don't think Notch is talking about "computer and mobile games are corrupting our kids". Considering he's the dev of Minecraft, I think he's more specific than that, and probably talk about the state of mobile gaming - and not about gaming itself.

Edit: In other words, Notch is the biggest indie success story of them all.

 

I wouldn't say he is the biggest indie success story of them all. The indie developers who came out of the computer revolution in the 80's are probably the biggest success stories of them all. Richard Garriott springs to mind. He was basically a notch who didn't get famous over night. Instead, he worked hard and become famous over time- until he was flown into outer space. Many who began as indie developers, are now owners of game development teams. Even better, people like Richard Garriott have a legend behind them and their work. Notch just has one thing, which you could argue was merely luck. (While infiniminer was not as lucky, heh.)

I don't think anyone assumes he is saying games are corrupting our kids. The example I used was misrepresenting the meaning I was trying to communicate.

It's not about "Kids these days..." or morals or values or whatever. That wasn't the relevant part of the example. The example was there to show the mindset of things changing for the worse, when they actually aren't- and sometimes quite the opposite is true. It's a common mindset among people who look down on the generation spawned after them, once they are coming of age.

I still don't have any confirmation as to what Notch is talking about. I only assume he is talking about F2P whale type mobile games. In which he is right, but also a lazy *@#$ for whining about it, and then admitting to apathy of action despite his ability to change things through both fame and money. I find it detestable when people have the capacity to change things, but instead merely comment on the change being negative while sitting back doing nothing about it.


edit: All I could find is that although he is not clear what he is talking about, it appears to be that the current "landscape" (his words) of games are inadequate. His solution is for more developers to push out more "good, honest games" (his words) which would result in dishonest games...losing? I guess?
His plan is naive at best. In the current mobile market, there is no way for developers to push out more 'honest games' than dishonest ones. Trash will flood the market because of a lack of quality control on the part of the merchant dispensing the goods. It is impossible (and a naive solution) because the number of crappy developers will always outweigh the number of quality ones.

 

I would think he's referring to all the crap that gets submitted to the app stores on a daily basis.

 

Mobile gaming evolved to what it is. The users of mobile phones have essentially voted with their behaviour and wallets to ensure mobile games are like this. What notch is saying doesn't make a lot of sense.

 

This, users are getting what they funded, still there are tons of games that don't follow the mindless style. Imo if Notch wants change he should do it himself, whining is easy but making the change is hard.

 

I don't know ... mobile games are supposed to be mindless and addicting.

You whip out your phone, play with it for five minutes, and put it back in your pants. You don't have a lot of time to get all deep and sentimental.

 

This is an easy position to take if you bundle all types of users together as one super-group. But is that really how we should look at it? I mean, "users of mobile phones" isn't a demographic or anything. It's literally saying something like "most people not in a 3rd world country (but some of them too)".

I can absolutely understand "core gamers" (I dislike the term, but it seems to be the one most used) being dissatisfied with the offerings on phone and tablet based mobile platforms. It didn't take long before I gave up looking for new games on iTunes, because I had to dig through shovelware to find anything remotely interesting, and most of what I ended up trying failed to hold my attention for more than 15 minutes. It's not about the prices, it's about how hard it is to find something that's actually good and that's not aimed at quick-play casual sessions - I'll happily pay far more than the average price of a paid mobile game for something that will actually entertain me.

The issue for me as a gamer is that the vast majority of stuff on iTunes is aimed at simlarish demographics, and I don't fit that demographic. It's not that the stuff is bad (there's plenty of quality available, we don't have to play junk), it's that there's so much stuff there that doesn't interest me that it's genuinely hard to find stuff that does. It's that there's an over saturation of stuff aimed at "everyone", and it's rare that the more niche stuff that manages to break through happens to suit my niche.

As it is, I don't even bother to search iTunes for games much any more. I'll occasionally check out something that other people tell me about, and sometimes I'll see what's currently featured. But if I want a new mobile game it's PSN on the Vita that I hit up. Partly because it's a dedicated gaming device and the games don't assume I'm after a casual quick hit. But also partly because games there aren't afraid to own a niche, and it's easy for me to find games there that suit whatever niche I'm looking for at the time.

 

The first thing that came to mind when I read that was EA's remake of Dungeon Keeper for the iPad and Android devices. The following article and the video embedded in it are an excellent summary of what's wrong with it:

How In-app Purchases Have Destroyed The Industry.

If that's any indication of how classics of yesteryear are to be done now on mobile, then yes, I would agree that mobile gaming needs saving.

 

The line in that tweet is a quote from that article. I don't know why the fuss is though, they were doing this in Farmville and Cityville years again. Apparrently it was so popular to buy your way through the game that I had to quite them because I couldn't make any progress. All that buying of achievement encouraged Zynga to make it such that your daily round of playing lasted 5 minutes if you were lucky before you ran out of 'energy'.

Most of my Facebook friends were playing those social games on Facebook back then but most of them have dropped them as they were too incessantly demanding of more money and they'd (game company) lose bought items in their dB. World's worse accounting systems. It's like the 'wave' you see sometimes in the crowd in sports stadiums - 2 or 3 times around at the most and they quit.

The real problem is how to indies and big game studios compete with freebies from the likes of Disney, especially since Disney bought Marvel to add an older audience (although I haven't read a comic book since AIT).

 

Jonathan Blow (designer of Braid) talks about how different media affect how you design your game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxFzf6yIfcc

The upshot of his talk is that these mobile and Facebook games are the equivalent of fast food or 30 minute sitcoms.

I agree with his analogy, but it's another question of whether we can be "saved" from it, or whether we should be. He points to a couple alternative games that are "deeper" than your typical junk food games:

1. Papers Please
2. The Binding of Isaac.

These are both good games, but they both also take a good amount of concentration to play. They're also both bad for 5 minute play sessions, as there is still quite a bit you have to keep track of between game sessions.

Ultimately I think it will be hard to get people to play deep games on mobile. There just isn't enough uninterrupted time.

 

I don't know, I've been on trains with immigration control searching suitcases and at airports doing the same thing. Seems the passport game would be ideal for 5 minute sessions, you could do 1 or 2 travelers in 5 minutes.

 

The missions in Papers Please do break down fairly easily into 5 minute sessions, but it still takes a good amount of concentration to play. It also has a pretty steady learning curve, and a good amount of carry-over between sessions. So that's why I think it would make it harder for the masses to adopt it.

 

I don't think there's a problem with mobile games and depth of experience, or extended play time. Broken Sword and Walking Dead aren't exactly struggling, and many serious sports games are hardly a cup of tea; play in incremental sessions, sure, but there are many games that as much depth as their desktop counterparts. Even casual games break this myth apart - I've seen my wife sat on the sofa all evening playing Candy Crush on her iPhone (a grown woman, too!).


If problems require solutions, then a solution is only possible if you understand the reason the problem exists in the first place, and the best solutions are usually alternatives. Tin openers were invented after canned food - even I remember using a knife to get at a tin of beans as a lad. Now we have tin openers, and nobody (outside a camping party) would suggest opening a tin of beans with a knife.

My point is: Things we think are set in stone, when it appears there's no chance of changing the status quo, can always be changed. They just need a better alternative, a new way to open canned food. Just as Freemium is an alternative to Premium, someone needs to come up with an alternative to Freemium (there are alternatives, but it's about getting one that sticks). And I think we're seeing attempts at this, albeit passively at the moment, in things like what UT are attempting with their cross-promotion and advertising plans. I don't know if that's the answer (I'd be on the front lines, getting bought out by megacorps if I did), but they're trying. And sooner I think rather than later, the Next Big Thing will take us all surprise once again.

Then we'll all be rich, happy and rolling around in indie game heaven. Maybe

 

Good to know I am not alone in using my brain to think, rather than falling down to worship this one-pony show (notch).

 

Since others have confirmed what I was already thinking (Wtf is notch talking about, Leaning on the side of him being wrong, etc.) then it seems to me that notch has fallen victim to "grandpa mode" just like I suspected.

I agree the exploitative/addictive cash shop scams are horrendous, but besides those...what do people expect from mobile gaming? It's not this amazing platform where people need super deep games.

Very few times do people have enough time to get involved in a deep game on mobile. Waiting for an appointment or doctors office is a good example, or perhaps young people at lunchtime when they have no friends or inbetween appointments (like college courses). Yet those times are not common enough to justify hordes of deep, complex, wonderfully crafted mobile games.

Who plays mobile games for longer than a brief moment anyway? Who wants depth? Mobile games make more sense as light-hearted, casual, minute-long moments of simplified gameplay. To complain about that is to not even grasp mobile gamers.
There is a reason there are so many games which focus on doing something for a few minutes, and then waiting 4-8 hours before fiddling with it again, but watching things grow as a response.

If people want to game, they turn on their console or computer. If they want to game mobile, they flip up their Nintendo DS, PSP, or Laptop. Maybe a tablet or ipad. Or whatever is cool these days as a portable (serious) gaming device. Phones are so tiny though, and you could text instead or surf the web for those few minutes inbetween. I just don't see any reason to complain about the (lack of?) 'quality mobile games'. Sure, there is a lot of trash... but most of it is easily avoidable or freely demo'd.

 

Who cares about Notch? Didn't he make a fortune by blatantly stealing someone else's game and releasing it first? He's not exactly a good example of morality in game development.

 

He did not steal anything. Saying the minecraft "stole" from infiniminer is like saying Call of Duty stole from wolfenstein. Heck, I dare you come up with a game that does not "steal" ideas from some other games. If everyone thought like you, there would be no new games since the 90's.

Besides, even if he actually used code from infinimer (I understand he didn't), it is till with the full permission of the authors since they released it under an open source license.

 

Ah, I had an important detail wrong. Apparently work on Minecraft started after Infiniminer got abandoned, for completely unrelated reasons.

 

To be honest, saying that a dev has to "do something" before they can criticise phenomena in their own industry is inane. Address what he says, not what he is. It appears what he's on about is the freemium model, and I can fully agree with him on that. The article linked earlier in this thread showed what freemium can mean, as well as the Angry Joe review.

If the mobile games dev wants a system that rips off their customers like those two examples show, then I will be perfectly within my rights to say 'Screw you'. If the mobile game devs wants a system that taps my phone for phone numbers, email addresses, and browsing history so that they can sell that to third parties, then it's a double 'screw you'.

As a gamer, I feel perfectly entitled to say that, and urge the mobile game devs to change their ways.

As I think Notch is doing, and which he is perfectly within his rights to do.

 

You know that by steal he means 'inspired' by. Notch said as much himself. And he started with the infiniminer code base. Notch isn't even programming on MineCraft anymore because to grow it they are trying to fragment it to turn it into something for everyone. And so you need a team dedicated to each niche you are trying to create.

Customers that can't pay or won't pay for such nakedly greedy IAP will stop playing like me my friends did with Farmville and Cityville, two games that became laughingly blatant in their reach for your bank account.

I see IAP the way I see the popularity of foreign vacations in Europe. You can't afford housing prices so you spend disposable income on vacations. That we say mobile IAP games need 'saving' says that we think gaming is truthfully a poor way to spend your free time because if you enjoyed it and felt it was worth while why would you argue that someone spends as much as a vacation to play the game? You don't hear arguments that the vacation to Ibiza was a waste of money do you? Even though they mostly just go back and forth between getting sunburned on the beach and getting drunk in the bars. In the UK, they could have at least avoided the sunburn.

There are plenty of games that don't steal from other games. Since Unity there are many amateurs creating games that have not even played a video game so if their work resembles prior art you can chalk it up to the limitations of Unity, the tutorial examples on offer, and human physiology and behavior. I've played maybe a dozen games my entire life and certainly not obsessively. I am purposely avoiding investigating new games for sale to avoid trying to emulate games on the market. However, a human being will look like a human being. It's not like surgery when a visiting surgeon wants to emulate a successful surgery of the doctor he's observing.

 

I actually did mean "steal" literally. I knew half the information first-hand and heard the other half second-hand. Someone mislead me into thinking that Infiniminer had been released in a beta state first, and then Notch started rapidly recreating it with Minecraft in order to reach a complete but shallower version first, and ended up with all the fame and success from it.
The way it really happened is that Infinimer was basically completed and released, but the creator was too loose with the source code and a bunch of people started hacking the crap out of it and creating pirate servers and such, so he abandoned the game all-together.
After Infinimer was gone, Notch realized the potential in the idea and made his own version of it.
So the game was not remotely original, but I wouldn't say he stole anything, since the original developer had already thrown it away.

 

Well to say 'stole literally' was wrong, maybe. He didn't steal the infiniminer source that I've ever heard although it was questionable to use that source once you know it was stolen, even if many others were using that source. Was notch one of the people that originally disassembled the source of infiniminer? If he was, then he's probably a risk to be sued as is that company (it makes no sense to sue those that don't have money even if they are culpable too). Hacking released software to obtain the code is theft, period. That the developer tried to look past this transgression and continue ultimately failed because, well, working with people that steal from you and treat you disrespectfully isn't enjoyable or profitable.

 

Minecraft is an example how you don't need planning to have a success.

 

If you don't want ads or cash shops, then you should buy lots of games that charge full-price up front. What's that? You don't actually want to pay anything at all and you just want devs to spend their lives making free games for you on zero income? Cool, just hang out in this corner over here with the "I only pirate all the games because all the games suck" crowd and we'll be sure to address your concerns in a timely manner.

 

I'd much rather buy a game for full price than try to guess how much money the cash shop is going to milk me for.

 

It's an excellent example of how copying a game and slapping a bit of polish on it works out well for most people.

 

Haha oh man you are salty.

Notch made a lot more than just polishing Infiniminer... but that won't stop people from being jealous I guess...

 

What a dumb analogy.

 

Been to Ibiza have we? ;-)

 

But who cares anyway?

Did Epic "steal" from id, and are we all upset about it?

 

Yall are dumb and angry just because Minecraft was popular. There's no evidence to say he wasn't going to market it or anything, if your game became one of the biggest games in the world would you bother with marketing? And it took infiniminer to a whole new realm of awesomeness, he made it into a awesome game and now everyone hates on him because he's rich.

 

Way to go, dick-bag. Crap like that is why people never admit they were wrong on the internet.

 

lol, "dick-bag".

 

Fraid it's infraction time. Try to keep it clean, folks.

Regarding the whole minecraft thing, I'm cool with it. But it's fun to know your history regardless.

 

Yes, we were But we got over it once we actually played it and saw those first outdoor scenes

 

Wait... Minecraft... polish? If Minecraft counts as "polished" then every other game in existence must be solid gold. I mean, I like Minecraft, but it's about as polished as a... really unpolished metaphor, or something.

 

How many full price cell phone games have you bought lately? The problem is that all the people I've met who say they "would" pay full price never actually do, with the excuse that no one has ever managed to make a game they're willing to pay full price for.

 

I'm one of those people The problem is (IMO - just guessing here) that it's only "core" gamers that seem to have that opinion, but they've usually got better platforms (ie: console or PC) that they'd rather purchase games on anyway.
While I'd rather pay full price for a great mobile game, none of them compare to the experience I'd get with a full-price console/PC game - and I don't think mobile will ever be able to match that.

So - we'll always have gamers that complain about IAP/freemium but are likely to never purchase a full-price mobile game, developers who see how successful the freemium model is in mobile games so push it through to PC/console, and casual gamers who are stuck in the middle and don't really care either way - after all, it's just a game..

 

That describes me perfectly.

I commonly pay $10+ for a PS Vita game, but it's rare that a phone/tablet game gets my interest at all.

 

Every game I play with any regularity is paid, on phone/tablet and on PC. I admit the number of games I play at all on phone is rather limited because like some others have mentioned I just don't find it a good gaming platform. For mobile I mainly play tower defense, one or two turn based strategy, and some roguelikes. Cash shop is just an instant turnoff to me, I know there is definitely a niche that feels the same even if it is a niche these days and not the majority.

My current weapon of time destruction is Age of Wonders III on PC though.

 

I hadn't seen that story before. Thanks for the link Hippo.
Gigi

 

I think if someone made a copy of minecraft, but took it forward graphically.. keeping it somewhat minimalistic but aesthetically pleasing... but dropping the freaking cube shyt once for all, I mean smooth those voxels a little... and maybe add some Dwarf Fortress type functionality... then we're getting somewhere!

Evidently people do buy mobile games. There are many paid games with several thousand downloads. Sometimes 100 thousands. And this is Google Play alone.
For example I do buy games on a regular basis. They're so cheap, why wouldn't I? I only hesitate when I've already bought a few games, then I say "well lets see if there's anything else really worth buying, and we'll call it the day"... but otherwise, at $3 or $4 it is no brainer, if it looks somewhat promising, BAM, purchase.
But, even at $2, sometimes I skip it... it's not even about the money sometimes a game is not even worth the space in my 16GB cellphone, I already have too many games, most I don't play (is that freaky?) bottom line a game must be good.

 

Yeah, you can sometimes get away with charging $1 - $4 up front. But I think most people who claim they want "full games" in the Google and iPhone store are expecting the sort of game that gets sold on PC for $60, and that sort of development cost can't be recouped by selling the game for $2 a pop.

 

Then you can wonder why they arent making games that go for $60 a pop then, or $40, or much more $20 games, or something like minecraft. I'm no big notch fan, ive never played minecraft and i don't care about it, however if i go do a search for games on my android phone looking for something that isnt mindless pap it's a pin in a haystack

While the statement 'people voted with their wallets' is true but also pretty vacant too, however you wish to see the chicken or the egg, people did not really, however, cause this, looking long-term. Mobiles were initially for making phonecalls, and when snake appeared on the nokia people figured its a great platform for simple games. People are now used to simple games, how educated do you think the average mobile phone owner is about the games industry or whatever demographic they're part of and what's being targeted at them and most importantly how does this person ever buy anything that isnt pap when they cant actually find anything that isn't pap. Every time i've looked at google play a search for 'not crap' wouldn't have proven productive

Mobiles were small and favored lighter gaming, people in this mindset still, with particular publishers making sure it stays that way. Noone heard of tablets? Anyone made a game with a vision like Journey or Ico that got any kind of recognition whatsoever (Youcan prove me wrong if you can), can you find these games trivially?

My mobile phone is probably (or definitely, lets go with that) more powerful than my previous desktop, and that desktop was not a slouch in its time, so why does every game in the store have the same (I generalise), increasingly irritating 2D cartoon style graphics. Why are they mindless. There's a whole paradigm there that was borne years ago by the form factor, this paradigm should be 6 feet under by now, but it's not, and i guess that's what notch was referring to

I can imagine many of the people in this thread develop for mobiles. Are they doing anything like Dear Esther? You could play that in bed. I'm a massive fan of the emerging 'walk-em-up' genre on desktops, it's an opportunity to be beautiful while not insipid (Crysis, Battlefield etc are jokes against the breadth of the medium), this should suit mobiles pretty decently, my S2 could do some pretty impressive things with the mali 400, i imagine my HTC One could blow my mind, phones can do these things

You cannot, as someone making their income from games development, say people voted with their wallets, you can say the developer wanted to make a quick buck so they made what would sell well, not something that had some unique, consequential conceptual integrity. If anyone can find me something of the latter, do let me know, it can help me decide what i make a game on next

Edit: The facebook comparison is absolutely irrelevant, facebook is not an entire market, and in my experience the games people play can be much down to their actual education on the matter. Like most media in fact

 

There are a few companies out there doing it, just very rare...XCOM: EU comes to mind. Pretty much requires iPad 4 but for $10 it is a steal, you basically get the same $60 PC game for your tablet.

 

Sure, sure, everyone who doesn't like the same games as you are drooling morons who don't know any better. Even if that's true, you need to go and buy the games you like if you actually expect anyone to make them for you. You claim you want expensive games of a certain genre, but then say you're too lazy to even bother searching for them on the Play Store. The Play Store can't read your mind and show you exactly the sort of games you want. You need to be willing to put a little effort into it. Especially if, as I'm willing to bet, you also hate ads for games and go out of your way to block them. It's not fair to blame the developers for not magically dropping their games into your lap.

 

But that's a trained behaviour. We look for games we want time and time again. We rarely if ever find them. The ones that we find that might be interesting and try rarely hold our attention for long. So we stop looking.

Yes, that means that we miss out on the occasional "diamond in the rough". But you know what? That's because we've already gone off to another platform that better serves our needs!

You can't blame a customer for not spending time with a provider that doesn't meet their desires when there are others who do. Why should UI keep checking iTunes when I know that PSN is far better suited to my tastes?

You're essentially saying that I'm partly to blame for the games available on iOS because I instead choose to spend my time on PSN.

Also, note that we're talking about time here, not money. I'm not overly price sensitive (in the context of iTunes prices) but I can't stand the idea of flicking through pages and pages of stuff that doesn't overly interest me when I know that other services can hook me up so much faster.

If you're standing between a supermarket and a bakery and all you want is a bread roll, which one are you walking into? And is the quality and price of bread in the supermarket then partly your responsibility?


(Just to be clear once more, I'm not saying I don't like iTunes as a platform etc. I'm just not the target audience of most of the games on there.)