Shopping for a portable game machine? Check out the iPod Touch first

Apple calls its new Touch “the funnest iPod ever” and, cute phrasing aside, the company is absolutely right.

Apple calls its new Touch “the funnest iPod ever” and, cute phrasing aside, the company is absolutely right.

In addition to being a full-on iPod, it is such a good gaming device that anyone shopping for a Sony PlayStation Portable or a Nintendo DS should look at the Touch first.

Slip either a PSP or a DS into a backpack and you’re guaranteed hours of fun portable gaming, but as good as these systems are the Touch has them beat, and on three fronts: technology, price and functionality.

The Touch sports newer and shinier technology, thanks to its touch screen and accelerometer. Two minutes into a game like Cro-Mag Rally ($1.99) you realize why people are talking about Apple gaming. It’s a standard driving game, but you steer by tilting the Touch, an experience closer to driving than you can get by pushing buttons. Considering that the motion-controlled Nintendo Wii is the most innovative console on the market today, it’s a little surprising that Apple got there first in the portable market.

Once you’ve played Cro-Mag Rally, take the accelerometer for a new ride with Nanosaur 2 ($0.99). It’s flying dinosaur adds up and down to Cro-Mag’s simpler left and right.

And the Touch is good value for the gaming dollar, even though the initial price is higher: an 8GB Touch costs $259 at time of writing, while the DS and PSP go for $130 and $170 respectively. That’s a significant difference but the Touch regains its ground as soon as you want to buy games. DS games cost $20 to $40, on average, with PSP titles costing up to $50. By comparison, Apple games are remarkably inexpensive: most cost less than $5 and, according to Mobclix, of the almost 3,000 games now in the Apple iStore, 20 per cent are free. Consider also Bejeweled 2, a standard of Palm and Windows Mobile gaming. For either of those platforms the game costs $15 to $20 (depending on where you get it); the Touch version is $2.99. It’s the same game from the same developer.   

New Touch owners will easily load 10 new titles in the first few days, while the same cannot be said for the competition. To be fair, games for the Touch may not be as immersive or complex, but it’s a brand new platform and developers are adding titles at a fast clip.

Lastly, when you want a break from games, the Touch is also an almost-complete PDA, lacking only a cell radio but delivering e-mail, calendaring, to-dos, contacts, etc. (And if you want a full smartphone, get an iPhone. It does all the same games.) While both the DS and the PSP (and especially the PSP) sport non-game features, the Touch wins on overall range of functionality. Just compare the Web browsing experience on a PSP to that of the Touch.

It’s important to note that Sony and Nintendo have not been standing still. The new PSP 3000 adds nice features, such as a built-in mic for Skype, and the upcoming DSi will add an online shop for game downloads, but the momentum certainly seems to be with the Touch, a reality not lost on industry big wigs. A recent Wall Street Journal piece states that Id Software and Sega are paying more attention to Apple’s platform, and that Sega has sold more than 500,000 copies of Super Monkey Ball for $10 a pop. Neil Young, an executive at Electronic Arts, is quoted in the article saying “It feels to me like there’s a real threat to their [Sony’s and Nintendo's] business…”

Designed primarily to play music and movies, the Touch and the iPhone are becoming contenders in the gaming world, and deserve consideration for your holiday shopping list.

Peter Wolchak
Backbone magazine

Filed Under: Games > Portable Devices > Reviews