IndustryGamers - Informing the Games Industry

Apple Tablet Has 150 Games, says Flurry

Posted January 25, 2010 by James Brightman

Last week, we reported that Electronic Arts was on board to support Apple's upcoming tablet device. The new Apple platform is expected to be announced this week, and based on data from mobile analytics firm Flurry, it would seem that gaming will play a very prominent role on the new tablet. Flurry's technology is being used to provide analytics for the apps, and therefore, the firm has been able to track apps being used by 50 tablet devices on Apple's Cupertino campus. As it turns out, 150 out of the 200 apps tracked are actually games.

Although there's no guarantee that Flurry's findings will be representative of the makeup of apps on the new tablet device, the firm appears to have the inside track. "Because Flurry could reliably 'place' these devices geographically on Apple's Cupertino campus, we have a fair level of confidence that we are observing a group of pre-release tablets in testing," Flurry wrote on its blog. "Testing of this device increased dramatically in January, with observed signs of life as early as October of last year. Apple appears to be going through its cycle of testing and polish, which is expected from any hardware or software company as it nears launch."

It seems the tablet could be targeting gaming even more than we originally thought, based on Flurry's findings. "Historically, tablet devices have been considered substitutes for anything where workers use clipboards, note pads or day runners. In more industrial settings, they could be used for inventory management, taking purchase orders or data entry. However, there was a surprising dearth of applications that support these use cases. Instead, the largest category was games. With a larger screen, more memory, multi-touch and multi-tasking expected, games will play better than ever on Apple handheld devices," Flurry noted.

Interestingly, the tablet seems to be running OS 3.2, which has not yet been released on the iPhone and iPod Touch (which are running on OS 3.1.2). So not only will the tablet take advantage of new functionality from the OS upgrade, but Apple will also leverage the 130,000+ applications already available in the App Store on day one, Flurry said.

This new Apple tablet points to another growth opportunity for the games industry. Portable devices like this will be key to the expansion, DFC Intelligence said recently in an IndustryGamers exclusive.

[Thanks to Mobile Entertainment for the tip]

James Brightman has been covering the games industry since 2003 and has been an avid gamer ever since the days of Atari and Intellivision. He was previously the EIC of GameDaily Biz.