Apple's Android app, interactive cinema, Rovio's Match3 - and other news of the week for the mobile developer

Apple will release an application for Android

Once upon a time, Steve Jobs vowed to destroy Android. Since then, much has changed in Apple’s policies, and the company is already actively developing its first Android application.

There are two reasons for this indulgence. Firstly, since Jobs’s aggressive statement, the share of Android smartphones has grown significantly and by the end of 2014 amounted to as much as 85%. Secondly, the basis of the application in question will be the Beats Music service, the purchase of which was released to the company at $ 3 billion, so the installation can only be done on Apple devices.

The Android app Apple deals with is a streaming music service, a competitor to Rdio and Spotify. It is claimed that the cost of a monthly subscription will be $ 8, which is $ 2 cheaper than Spotify. The service will support a cloud storage model and have some functions of a social network.

80.1 million US users download at least 1 application in 2015

Such figures are cited by eMarketer in their study . This third of the total number of US residents who have devices. We are talking about all mobile devices, including those that are not particularly designed to work with the application. Therefore, for iOS and Android devices, the performance will be higher.

The difference between smartphone and tablet users is also interesting. On the tablet, 60.9 million (44%) are ready to pay for the paid application, while on the smartphone only 65.2 million (35.8%).

Paid applications have long given way to free ones (including with the option of internal purchases). The volume of the two markets in incomes differ hundreds of times. As for the number of downloads, the difference is not very big either. 93% of smartphone owners in America download at least one application within a year, and over 90% of tablet owners.

Apple sets new records!

Following the auction on February 10, 2015, Apple's stock price hit a record high of $ 122.02 per share. The capitalization of the American mobile giant exceeded $ 700 billion, according to exchanges, and this makes Apple the first American company to reach such heights! In second place, but with an amount more than 2 times smaller, is Microsoft - $ 347.5 billion.

Rovio launches its Match-3, while Supercell closes

Following a soft launch in Canada, Supercell decided to close its latest Spooky Pop project. This is not to say that it was a very classic Match-3, they added a tactical component to it, and the game ceased to be dynamic. It was more like a puzzle, and they are extremely rarely truly massive.

And now, against the backdrop of such news, Rovio is launching , so far only in Thailand, its Match-3 Angry Birds Fight! It is not difficult to guess that this is again a battle of birds with pigs. For a limited time, the player needs to pick up as many chips as possible, and the more collected, the stronger the attack of the hero. Judging by projects with similar gameplay, they have every chance of being fun and gaining their audience.

Interestingly, what is the reason for the increased activity of the Finns? Recently, they have been actively making games, but so far have not been able to repeat their own success.

Is it time for an interactive movie?

The App Store has more and more games in the interactive movie genre. The plot of such a game is usually linear, and players just need to click on a specific area of ​​the screen on time or select one of the answer options in a dialogue with the game's heroes in order to see the continuation of the story.

It happens that the ending or the scenario depends on the player’s choice, but usually there are very few such branches or they quickly return to the general plot. But the very fact of participation in history, albeit so indirectly, can captivate a certain audience, especially when it comes to playing on some famous series or film.

One of the striking examples of such a series of games was the new release of the legendary Fahrenheit, which the players were looking forward to. Together with the new Fahrenheit in the same genre, the release of Sons of Anarchy: The Prospect, created based on the eponymous movie series, took place.

It is worth noting that in such games it is difficult to implement the F2P model and make money on additional content, but on fans of the popular series, you can try to increase sales of a paid or freemium application.

Developers from all countries, unite!

The question may not be mobile directly, but the development is not mobile and desktop, it’s in the head, dance and experience pure thoughts. An interesting trend is that developers unite and arrange online streaming development. For example, a subreddit is dedicated to this, for which the translation tracker has already been written on a tweet , where right now, for example, you can see the broadcast of the JRPG / bagel development on Unity3D.

In addition to the entertaining element, to watch how they program while you program (we need to go deeper!), During breaks when there are no broadcasts from game and other coding jams, the main charge, of course, that carries the initiative is educational. Keeping up with the times coming on all fronts of online learning, the addition of pure practice, the direct transfer of experience, methods, and with a clear result, for everyone who is learning or is thinking of learning something new.

For example, on the same subreddit, the “Learning Haskell” broadcast is offered, the votes are collected for the Rails broadcast, html5 / css. And most importantly, once recorded, the experience will not be lost and will be available to everyone at any time. A very interesting undertaking, don’t you?

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