GLOBAL -Over 750 of you voted in our most recent Conversations poll, in which asked what is the most important feature in a mobile gaming device? This was an immense response, matched by a stack of smart comments, so thanks for getting really stuck in with your opinions and voting in such great numbers.
Read on to find out which mobile gaming feature gained the highest score.
Top of the tree, with a staggering 46% of the vote, is ‘great graphics and sound’. As an avid mobile gamer, I can totally understand why this has risen to the surface as a core (and age-old) gaming requirement, because aside from brilliant gameplay (which is, of course, crucial yet far less definable and not a tick-box feature), great visuals and audio help deliver the most immersive experience possible by seductively removing the barrier you otherwise face by poor graphics and sound, no? That’s not to say I entirely agree with this, see I still love the retro classics, such as Tetris and PacMan, and can get just as immersed when playing that sort of game on the move. What do you reckon? Either way, this time beauty wins.
In second place is a ‘large catalogue of games’ with 16% of the vote. Choice and variety is clearly a key feature when it comes to mobile gaming. I can currently count a catalogue of 44 games on the N-Gage site. Is this still too few? What constitutes a large catalogue would you say – hundreds, thousands?
Next up is ‘dedicated easy gaming controls’, as found on the Nokia N97, with 9% of the vote. ‘Multiplayer gaming’ landed the fourth spot with 5%, alongside ‘other answer’ which also gained 5% – a couple of top suggestions here being ‘3D graphics chip (it’s all about the graphics folks), ‘online multiplayer games’ and our old friend ‘all of the above’.
Nokia’s ‘N-Gage’ service came in next with 4%, with a ‘big screen’ also gaining the same number of votes.
I was surprised to see ‘long battery life’ only land in 8th place. Especially after it was voted the most important feature in a music phone. Are gaming and music so very different in terms of how we use them on the move and our experience expectations?
‘Big name games’, the ‘ability to move bought games onto a new device’ and ‘cheap games’ each earned 2% of the vote. Leaving ‘large comfortable numeric keypad’ and ‘Java game support’ languishing at the bottom of the pile.
Share your thoughts, as ever, in the comments section directly south.