So, I finally joined the mobile revolution and bought an iPad Mini. This is my “sort of review” – but I really don’t know enough about mobile and tablets to compare and contrast, so it’s more of a blog about the bloomin’ thing!
Firstly, why did I buy it? Until a couple of months ago I really couldn’t see the point. I get my gaming fix on PC. What about movies? Well, what’s the point of paying to download movies to watch on a relatively teeny-tiny screen? And then there’s this whole “mobile” thing. I had a Gameboy in my schooldays but since then I’ve never really felt the burning urge to play games when I’m out and about. Games are things I play when I can concentrate. At home. With a cup of coffee and a cigarette on the go.
Then this flipping thing happened: a ton of companies started to release games exclusively for iOS and some of these games really appealed to me. Rodeo Games released their “Hunters” series (which reminded me a lot of games like Lazer Squad and the original X-Com) and then they went and released “Warhammer Quest”. This is one of my all time favourite table top fantasy games (infuriatingly discontinued by Games Workshop only 3 years after its release in the mid nineties). I just had to buy it, didn’t I? And that meant buying an iPad.
But having tinkered around for a week or so now – getting familiar with the different apps and conditioning my brain to stop looking for things like a central data folder (everything is controlled through the apps themselves) – I’ve started to remember what the appeal is with mobile gaming. And I think I might even have started to understand exactly what the niche is that tablets fill. They’re smaller than a laptop but functionally connected (in a way I’ve found mobile phones, for all their versatility, not to be. You can’t comfortably browse the net on a mobile in my humble opinion). Tablets are actually powerful enough to reproduce media in a high enough quality that it’s actually enjoyable whilst still satisfying the criteria that they be portable.
Are you an iPad or tablet fanboy/girl? What’s the appeal for you? Did you jump on the bandwagon years ago or – like me – has something piqued your interest recently and you’re considering it for the first time? Feel free to leave a comment below.