iPad Is Taking Console’s Share On The Gaming Market

It is well known that iPad is a fine gaming device. And it looks like Apple is going to improve iPad’s entertainment capabilities as it is a new trend nowadays. Some well-known publishers pay most attention to gaming aspect of the iPad as consumers gradually lose interest in gaming on traditional consoles. Console’s long upgrade cycle, expensive software and hardware for them and allure of touch gaming devices are main contributing factors to the decline of the console business.  Recently The Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello said IndustryGamers:

Consoles used to be 80% of the industry as recently as 2000. Consoles today are 40% of the game industry, so what do we really have? I think that the pattern against which Nintendo is no longer resonating is over anyway. We have a new hardware platform and we’re putting out software every 90 days. Our fastest growing platform is the iPad right now and that didn’t exist 18 months ago.

This statement is strong evidence that Apple is really an important player in the gaming business. So it’s no surprise that Nintendo called Apple “enemy of the future” and lowered the price for its 3DS device from $249 to $169, because iPad and iPhone gradually allure its users.

Among other advantages of such platforms as iOS are low requirements to become an official developer (initial fee of $99), a great number of free and cheap games and Apple Store’s ease of distribution that is unmatched yet.

Google also might take some share of this market when Google TV in Honeycomb update will bring games to the big screens. Apple will likely as well work on Apple TV software to allow user play games in the living room.

As you may remember, mobile entertainment industry was estimated at $33 billion last year and Geekaphone blog presented cool infographic on this subject, showed below

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