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What developers say Apple needs to do to make the Apple TV a gaming console

18 points by extraterra 8y ago

nilkn 8y ago
It's definitely the lack of a bundled controller. The Siri remote is completely unsuitable for the great majority of games. While third-party controllers exist, it's not a viable proposition for a studio to make a controller-required game when so few Apple TV owners have such a controller. (And in fact, while this may or may not be true today, I believe at least initially Apple required all games to be playable with just the Siri remote, so controller support could never be more than optional.) If Apple had bundled in a controller and funded a few high quality games that don't have microtransactions, it probably could be a pretty serious game console.
- b_tterc_p 8y ago
  “A few high quality games” seems like it’s handwaving a rather large part, no?
  - nilkn 8y ago
    I don’t think so. Apple has a vast budget. Even just bundling a controller would’ve made a significant difference with no funding of games. I also don’t think they would’ve needed to fund entirely new games, just support a few indie ports to kick it off, similar to what Nintendo did with the Switch.
  - protomyth 8y ago
    Considering that are paying for TV show development, video games should not be beyond them.
- dawnerd 8y ago
  The Siri remote is barely usable for content consumption alone. The trackpad is the most frustrating part of a remote I’ve ever used.
simonh 8y ago
I've been interested in Apple TV for ages, but the demo setups in the apple stores have been terrible. My WDTV is on it's last legs so I'm in the market for a replacement TV client for streaming video. I'd like that to be an Apple TV, but for £200 it needs to be a properly viable games machine, or it just doesn't offer enough value over a £30 Chromecast. Nintendo had the controller issue solved 12 years ago with the Wii. Come on Apple!
- dawnerd 8y ago
  Get an nvidia shield. Plays any file you can throw at it and they update it pretty regularly. My original shieldnis still kicking and working great.
andrewmcwatters 8y ago
Apple doesn't give a shit about games, and they're a detriment to the company's overall brand image anyway. This much is crystal clear, and there's no incentive whatsoever to be a game developer working in Apple's ecosystem save the UNIX background. Everything marketed as game-capable on any of Apple's products is convenient happenstance that they're taking advantage of, and none of it is planned for. VR on iMac Pro: Great you finally had enough pixel fill-rate to catch up with sub-$2k systems. No one plays VR on iMac Pro. Who's the demographic there? Professionals? Nah, performance is still better on Windows systems. Metal: Instead of letting vendors write the graphics drivers, you do, so you control the graphics stack, too. Great, but not for games. This might make your expensive windowing system run a bit better on your 5k monitors, though. ProMotion: Fantastic for professionals, especially artists, and great for consumers, but those rates are utilized mostly in hardware accelerated software, and not for usage in iOS games. Unless the game is simple and has a low polygon budget, you're not holding consistent 120 FPS. It's not happening. Maybe in legacy titles finally ported to iPad and iPhone. Game capabilities in Apple's hardware are possible with them pursuing other features, but they are never a focus. That's perfectly fine! But Apple will never produce a game friendly platform and you need to understand that when developing games. Engines that conveniently have the ability to compile to Apple's hardware targets should be thought of as a nice-to-have and not a core feature. Apple's iPhone games are a development-expensive variant of the flash games of yesteryear, with far less accessibility to young artists and developers.
- earenndil 8y ago
  Ahhh so that's why high-quality games keep coming to ios.
  - andrewmcwatters 8y ago
    Ahhh, but they don't. They're ports.
newscracker 8y ago
> Apple needs to do more than just offer developers the tools to make games for its platforms. It needs to sell consumers on the fact that these machines are for games. Apple needs to do a whole lot more first for the Apple TV to be considered close to iOS devices. The remote is an abomination that Apple should get rid of and then go back to the drawing board with a new design team. Usability wise, it's terrible — tiny, slippery, symmetrical shape where one can't figure out quickly where the buttons are and doesn't have enough buttons for control (the behavior when the side edges are pressed is unpredictable and annoying). As for tvOS, it's neglected by Apple to such an extent that there's not much going on in every release. It's still a "hobby" project that Apple can't decide to spend time and money on. After all these years of apps on the platform, there is still no straightforward way to update apps individually from the App Store! Seriously, if that's not a sign of it being a hobby project or almost abandonware, I don't know what is. Apple needs to show that it's serious about the Apple TV, for real. It seems to be distracted with things not directly related to Apple TV. If the past and this year are any indication, it's clear that there won't be a game controller from Apple for the foreseeable future. There are other broken things that need to be fixed for Apple TV to be taken seriously in this space.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 8y ago
  I have the remote for the 3rd generation of ATV, and I would also describe it as slippery. Usually what happens is you're typing something in (instead of using Siri, which actually works quite well usually) like your password when you have someone over that shouldn't know it, you are swiping left and right across a 26-letter row and always swipe just a little bit too far and have to go back to the letter you wanted. If you have an iPhone nearby it works perfectly to just use that keyboard though as well. I'm not sure if it's the input device itself or the software for the keyboard input that's worse, but it does need a rework. TVOS is alright - I found it better for navigation and visual aesthetics than the Roku that I had switched from - though Roku might have improved in that realm since that was three years ago. Symmetrical did bother me too. Far too often I would pick up the remote and start moving my thumb over the "wrong" side of the remote, having to switch it around. I finally fixed that by buying some nice rubber cases from Amazon which made it bigger and easier to hold (also prevented it from slipping out of my hand, as it is a little slippery as well) and also let me quickly identify which side was the correct one for your thumb, since the rubber encasing covers the "wrong" side. I didn't have much problem with the side buttons, but one thing did stand out about that button that your comment reminded me of: The hilariousness of figuring out that it existed when I first bought the thing. I had plugged in the ATV and could not for the life of me figure out how to get past the welcome screen. After five minutes of head scratching I do a quick Google and figure out you actually have to press down on the square on the remote. Ohhhhhh. There was a whole thread of people on the Apple forums who had the same problem of not monkey pressing the right button to figure out how the thing worked.

18 points by extraterra 8y ago

It's definitely the lack of a bundled controller. The Siri remote is completely unsuitable for the great majority of games. While third-party controllers exist, it's not a viable proposition for a studio to make a controller-required game when so few Apple TV owners have such a controller. (And in fact, while this may or may not be true today, I believe at least initially Apple required all games to be playable with just the Siri remote, so controller support could never be more than optional.) If Apple had bundled in a controller and funded a few high quality games that don't have microtransactions, it probably could be a pretty serious game console.

b_tterc_p 8y ago
“A few high quality games” seems like it’s handwaving a rather large part, no?
- nilkn 8y ago
  I don’t think so. Apple has a vast budget. Even just bundling a controller would’ve made a significant difference with no funding of games. I also don’t think they would’ve needed to fund entirely new games, just support a few indie ports to kick it off, similar to what Nintendo did with the Switch.
- protomyth 8y ago
  Considering that are paying for TV show development, video games should not be beyond them.
dawnerd 8y ago
The Siri remote is barely usable for content consumption alone. The trackpad is the most frustrating part of a remote I’ve ever used.

simonh 8y ago

I've been interested in Apple TV for ages, but the demo setups in the apple stores have been terrible. My WDTV is on it's last legs so I'm in the market for a replacement TV client for streaming video. I'd like that to be an Apple TV, but for £200 it needs to be a properly viable games machine, or it just doesn't offer enough value over a £30 Chromecast. Nintendo had the controller issue solved 12 years ago with the Wii. Come on Apple!

dawnerd 8y ago
Get an nvidia shield. Plays any file you can throw at it and they update it pretty regularly. My original shieldnis still kicking and working great.

andrewmcwatters 8y ago

Apple doesn't give a shit about games, and they're a detriment to the company's overall brand image anyway. This much is crystal clear, and there's no incentive whatsoever to be a game developer working in Apple's ecosystem save the UNIX background. Everything marketed as game-capable on any of Apple's products is convenient happenstance that they're taking advantage of, and none of it is planned for. VR on iMac Pro: Great you finally had enough pixel fill-rate to catch up with sub-$2k systems. No one plays VR on iMac Pro. Who's the demographic there? Professionals? Nah, performance is still better on Windows systems. Metal: Instead of letting vendors write the graphics drivers, you do, so you control the graphics stack, too. Great, but not for games. This might make your expensive windowing system run a bit better on your 5k monitors, though. ProMotion: Fantastic for professionals, especially artists, and great for consumers, but those rates are utilized mostly in hardware accelerated software, and not for usage in iOS games. Unless the game is simple and has a low polygon budget, you're not holding consistent 120 FPS. It's not happening. Maybe in legacy titles finally ported to iPad and iPhone. Game capabilities in Apple's hardware are possible with them pursuing other features, but they are never a focus. That's perfectly fine! But Apple will never produce a game friendly platform and you need to understand that when developing games. Engines that conveniently have the ability to compile to Apple's hardware targets should be thought of as a nice-to-have and not a core feature. Apple's iPhone games are a development-expensive variant of the flash games of yesteryear, with far less accessibility to young artists and developers.

earenndil 8y ago
Ahhh so that's why high-quality games keep coming to ios.
- andrewmcwatters 8y ago
  Ahhh, but they don't. They're ports.

newscracker 8y ago

> Apple needs to do more than just offer developers the tools to make games for its platforms. It needs to sell consumers on the fact that these machines are for games. Apple needs to do a whole lot more first for the Apple TV to be considered close to iOS devices. The remote is an abomination that Apple should get rid of and then go back to the drawing board with a new design team. Usability wise, it's terrible — tiny, slippery, symmetrical shape where one can't figure out quickly where the buttons are and doesn't have enough buttons for control (the behavior when the side edges are pressed is unpredictable and annoying). As for tvOS, it's neglected by Apple to such an extent that there's not much going on in every release. It's still a "hobby" project that Apple can't decide to spend time and money on. After all these years of apps on the platform, there is still no straightforward way to update apps individually from the App Store! Seriously, if that's not a sign of it being a hobby project or almost abandonware, I don't know what is. Apple needs to show that it's serious about the Apple TV, for real. It seems to be distracted with things not directly related to Apple TV. If the past and this year are any indication, it's clear that there won't be a game controller from Apple for the foreseeable future. There are other broken things that need to be fixed for Apple TV to be taken seriously in this space.

SOLAR_FIELDS 8y ago
I have the remote for the 3rd generation of ATV, and I would also describe it as slippery. Usually what happens is you're typing something in (instead of using Siri, which actually works quite well usually) like your password when you have someone over that shouldn't know it, you are swiping left and right across a 26-letter row and always swipe just a little bit too far and have to go back to the letter you wanted. If you have an iPhone nearby it works perfectly to just use that keyboard though as well. I'm not sure if it's the input device itself or the software for the keyboard input that's worse, but it does need a rework. TVOS is alright - I found it better for navigation and visual aesthetics than the Roku that I had switched from - though Roku might have improved in that realm since that was three years ago. Symmetrical did bother me too. Far too often I would pick up the remote and start moving my thumb over the "wrong" side of the remote, having to switch it around. I finally fixed that by buying some nice rubber cases from Amazon which made it bigger and easier to hold (also prevented it from slipping out of my hand, as it is a little slippery as well) and also let me quickly identify which side was the correct one for your thumb, since the rubber encasing covers the "wrong" side. I didn't have much problem with the side buttons, but one thing did stand out about that button that your comment reminded me of: The hilariousness of figuring out that it existed when I first bought the thing. I had plugged in the ATV and could not for the life of me figure out how to get past the welcome screen. After five minutes of head scratching I do a quick Google and figure out you actually have to press down on the square on the remote. Ohhhhhh. There was a whole thread of people on the Apple forums who had the same problem of not monkey pressing the right button to figure out how the thing worked.