The early years of modern gaming were filled with barriers of entry for those looking get involved – whether this be from the higher price of having to purchase a dedicated console, to the prices of games themselves which continue to be expensive even to this day. Back in 2008, both Apple and Google released their own versions of an app marketplace through the App Store and the Android Market, with both forever changing the gaming landscape into the future.
The android marketplace would later fall back under the Google banner and become the Google Play Store, but along with the App Store they have both seen little change in the way they operate as the first round had been so successful. The introduction had removed many of these barriers to entry for gaming, a dedicated device was no longer needed as games could simply be downloaded to your mobile device and played at your own whim, and with mobile devices both now and then having few differences in hardware and performance, if a game ran on one device, it’s likely it would run fine on the majority of others too.
The biggest and most successful games quickly became those that were much simpler in style and offered familiarity, puzzle and arcade games in particular still reign supreme even today as the provide an option for the casual player to click in and click out without risk of losing progress or falling behind – platforms such as online casinos here at Max for example are amongst the most played as despite initiatives aimed at slowing the growth, many similar services have allowed players to find the benefits of this growing ease of access, particularly as a growing audience is now more receptive to the idea of gaming, particularly on their mobile device.
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This had also caused a huge shift for the way many developers could monetize games – the advent of mobile gaming launched a marketplace that had focussed on microtransactions are additional payments to cover the cost of development rather than an upfront cost for the game itself – premium features or add-ons that would enhance the service in a small way had managed to play a larger role in the success too, so much so that it would lead other platforms to follow a similar path for offering free titles with payment options in game to gain some small benefit.
Newer devices are starting to pack more of a punch as they become loaded with features and new hardware to improve performance but are still a long way off what is offered by more dedicated platforms, but as the gap starts to close so will the types of games available, and as the player base continues to increase as attitudes towards gaming change as a whole, the number of players will only increase at a similar rate too.
