One of my friends has recently become a full time games designer so I’ve been able to have a few interesting chats with him about various video game related topics – including designing for smartphones. One of the things we’ve spent a while discussing is that one of the most interesting aspects of smartphone games design – from a history …
Here are two current problems in the field of social media: Firstly, a tricky issue for businesses wanting to make use of social media has always been the difficulty in precisely quantifying the benefits. The main reason for this is that social media has been used mainly in a marketing capacity and, although various analytics are available, it is nonetheless …
With last week’s release of Nintendo’s long-awaited follow-up to the Wii console – the Wii U – it’s a good time to discuss innovation in the world of console design. In particular I’d like to focus on something which made the original Wii such a hit – its original hardware interfacing (i.e. controller) – which is something Nintendo have tried …
The past couple of years haven’t been kind on RIM, the makers of Blackberry smartphones, with nosediving market-share reducing what was once a market-leader to a floundering minnow uncertain where to head next. It’s all Apple’s fault – their vision of touchscreen phones has taken over the market to the extent that very few devices now still feature a physical …
Tablets are in the news at the moment. A lot. In the sales and marketing world, Christmas has clearly begun and the speed with which these fancy new products are being released is pretty staggering. The volume of attendant advertising is equally abundant. Last Christmas the tablet market was pretty large – and the big winners turned out to be …
In the past couple of years the major limitation on smartphone computing has been data transfer speeds. Smartphones are now extremely versatile and increasingly affordable devices, supported by a huge range of mobile apps and operating systems. The main issue impacting negatively on user experience has been slow data transfer speeds afforded by 3G networks which often struggled with patchy …
With the recent launch of Apple’s iPhone 5 making headlines all week, most of the focus has been on the usual debates about sales figures and comparisons with previous, or expected performance. In short, the iPhone 5 is a monster success – it has so far outsold every previous handset and looks set to earn Apple another massive wedge of …
Up and down the country a new academic term is starting for hundreds of thousands of students in the UK – an exciting and stimulating experience which will hopefully be vital in their personal, social, and professional development. The latter especially – professional development – is increasingly central to students’ priorities, knowing that the current job market for graduates is …
The Apple vs. Samsung patent war has recently been the major tech story in most mainstream media outlets: not surprising when we remember that many news organisations basically equate newsworthiness with Apple relatedness. However, with this type of coverage, it’s sometimes easy to miss some of the finer points which reveal themselves if we take a broader perspective. With that …
The smartphone is a complex beast. Once upon a time we used to have pagers, mobile phones, digital cameras, mp3 players, gameboys, PDA’s, calculators and GPS navigators. All these separate gadgets have now been successfully incorporated into the modern (top-end) smartphone. Some people still use individual devices – but the trend is clear: smartphones are gobbling up anything and everything …