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Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

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Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#341

Post by ArchOversight »

dataworm wrote: post #284
masklinn wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, the 6th gen Mini uses an A15, and has USB 3 speeds support (only 5Gb but still). So apple might have had USB3 speeds support in the A15 specifically for the mini, or they might have included USB3 support for a while in all SoC and enable it selectively for segmentation purposes. That would gel with the comparison between the iPad Air 5th gen and the iPad Pro 5th gen: they both use the desktop-class…

The 4th gen iPad Air uses an A14 and also has USB 3 support. So Apple is using a PCIe USB 3.0 controller for USB 3.0 iPads. They could've easily done that on the iPhone 15, so it's market segmentation.

> They could've easily done that on the iPhone 15, so it's market segmentation.

Adding additional chips/additional controllers is not "easily" done. The iPads have more space to spare on their boards, and have larger batteries that can absorb the additional power requirements for running those additional chips much easier.

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#342

Post by smoldesu »

chaostheory wrote: post #328
smoldesu wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Valve had no problem porting thousands of games to Steam Deck without paying developers a dime. It is a proven fact that a functional DXVK/Wine runtime can support more AAA video games than whatever Apple is paying for. You keep bringing this around to revenue, but Apple could solve this problem if they didn't benefit from the status quo. A company 10x smaller than them did it, a company with full control over their…

Steam is a DRM platform. Other than that I agree with everything you said. What you’re missing is that Apple has their own proton that they’re using to help developers port their games like what Valve is doing with proton. Imo most of Apple still hates games if it didn’t bring in so much revenue. Now we have a small team trying to change that at Apple similar to how WSL for Windows came to being. I just hope that the…

Apple's Proton is just a fork of DXVK with less upstream support and a more restrictive redistribution license. The best "support" money can buy is killing Game Porting Toolkit and supporting Vulkan in-OS. They're already an underdog in the graphics API world, playing hardball with people who don't care will just end up in a lot of unported games.

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#343

Post by hbn »

pradn wrote: post #200

The reduction in weight is a major feature - my iPhone 14 Pro routinely strains my hand.

When the 14 Pro came out I bought one day 1 to replace my 12 mini.

I figured the size would be an issue, and I definitely didn't like it as much as the 12 mini. But the worst part I didn't even foresee was the weight. It was SUPER uncomfortable to use one-handed, I was constantly terrified it would fall out of my hand. I ended up returning it and buying a 13 mini.

The switch to titanium is a good move. Even barring the weight, while the stainless steel is certainly eye-catching and looks great out of the box, as soon as you use the thing it's covered in smudges, and infamously is prone to getting covered in scratches over time.

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#344

Post by NeoTar »

absoluteunit1 wrote: post #220
paxys wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it though? The promise of gaming on iPhone (and mobile gaming in general) has been taken over and destroyed by freemium games whose only goal is to push microtransactions. What is a marginally better GPU going to accomplish? Help games sell me their "bundle of gems" faster? Developers simply do not have the incentive to build any other kinds of games when the current crop of addictive shovelware is so damn profita…

I really wish micro transactions were made illegal in applications on the app stores…and video games in general. It encourages additive behaviour and lowers the quality of games as the purpose becomes to make the additive micro transaction aspect as addictive as possible. If some new policy changed this, I think we’d see a whole new wave of higher quality games

How would you define a micro-transaction?

Maybe we need a pornography-like definition ("I know it when I see it") but I think there is certainly a continuum from high-quality DLC / expansions to existing games (which can be basically a new game) down to crystals which allow you to instantly buy something which you'd have got anyway if you had waited.

So, consider a basic, Mario-kart like racing game - which of these are OK, and which are micro-transactions?

- buying additional courses,

- buying additional characters (drivers), vehicles, or components of vehicle (e.g. wheels, engines, bodies),

- buying purely cosmetic changes (e.g. driver outfits, vehicle colours),

- buying permanent upgrades to your vehicle(s) (i.e. more speed, better acceleration, better handling)

- buying one-off power-ups that last for a single race, or are time-limited (+50% acceleration for 1 hour)

- buying 'cheats' - obvious play-to-win items (e.g. needing to complete 1 fewer lap than your opponent),

- buying regular game-progression; e.g. maybe 100 races/wins/hours of play are normally required to unlock all courses, but this can also be instantly purchased.

- any of the above options, but not bought directly, but rather via purchasing 'crystals' which can be exchanged for the above.

- any of the above options, but in a 'gatcha' style (i.e. loot boxes; you cannot choose which upgrade you want),

I think I'd be totally OK with the top three, maybe OK with buying permanent upgrades, and unlocking game progression (in this case), but the others are too far for me.

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#345

Post by Chatting »

internetter wrote: post #298
__loam wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steam also takes 30% from the first $10 million in sales, so I'm not sure what it is about the app store that incentivizes this. The incentives are arguably identical on Steam. I think it has more to do with the nature of the device (Touch controls, people using it on their bathroom breaks, etc) than it does with any economic situations.

To be fair, steam offers a massive amount of goodies on top, including a built in mod store, tools for multiplayer, forums, and many more. I'd argue that the platform is worth at least 10% if used to it's fullest (and after a certain threshold the 30% goes down anyway — though imo it should start low for small studios) The same cannot be said for the app store. Save from basic DRM (steam has this), leaderboards (stea…

Plus, as a developer, you're not required to go through Steam, if you don't think it's worth it.

There are plenty of other options (Epic Games, Microsoft Store, etc.), each with a different revenue share arrangement. Or you can self-publish on your own website and infrastructure (Minecraft did this and it worked out pretty well for them).

Most developers (not all!) clearly have decided that the value Steam provides (features+audience) is worth it. But, crucially, with Steam, it's a choice. With iOS, it's not. You are forced to go through the App Store whether you like it or not (for now, at least). And if tomorrow Apple decides that 30% is not enough and they'd like a bit more, there's not much you can do about it.

(Apologies if this is not terribly relevant to the rest of the thread, but it bugs me when I see this kind of "apples to apples" comparisons between Steam and the App Store)

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#346

Post by hbn »

deergomoo wrote: post #323
HatchedLake721 wrote: post #33

The best part for me that wasn't mentioned, the slightly rounded corners! I hate holding anything since iPhone 12 in my hands, the edges are sharp and cut into your fingers. Every time I take iPhone X I'm just amazed how comfortable it is and what a step back was the iPhone 12 design.

Visually I much prefer the squared off edges, but I agree. The 14 Pro is the first iPhone I’ve regulsrly used a case with because I just cannot keep hold of the damn thing—when the phone angles as I reach across the screen I guess the lack of surface area touching my hand means it sorta just pops out. I find it really bad ergonomically. Flat edges with rounded corners seems a nice middle ground. What I really want is…

The 14 Pro's edges are also worse because of how damn heavy the thing is.

The 15 Pro is said to be about 9% lighter thanks to the titanium, so hopefully that will alleviate some of that issue too.

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#347

Post by Firmwarrior »

xienze wrote: post #169
paxys wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it though? The promise of gaming on iPhone (and mobile gaming in general) has been taken over and destroyed by freemium games whose only goal is to push microtransactions. What is a marginally better GPU going to accomplish? Help games sell me their "bundle of gems" faster? Developers simply do not have the incentive to build any other kinds of games when the current crop of addictive shovelware is so damn profita…

Yeah, exactly. They’ve been playing up how the latest iPad/iPhone/etc. is just as powerful as for years now. And I don’t doubt that. But it doesn’t do much good when barely anything approaching AAA gaming shows up on the platform. The potential is wasted on lots of garbage freemium games.

Yeah, I'm so sick of lugging a Switch and a ridiculously huge Steam Deck around when my iPhone 14 is way more powerful than either one, but all that power is wasted since there just aren't enough decent games to play

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#348

Post by jordanmorgan10 »

paxys wrote: post #24
highwaylights wrote: post #3

The most interesting part of this to me isn't the titanium or the camera (impressive as it looks), it's the GPU. They made a point of saying that the GPU had been completely ground-up re-designed, and I assume they're intending to keep scaling that up over the next few iterations. They didn't talk about it for very long, but that the phone is able to convincingly run AAA games, even at playable if not great frame-rat…

Is it though? The promise of gaming on iPhone (and mobile gaming in general) has been taken over and destroyed by freemium games whose only goal is to push microtransactions. What is a marginally better GPU going to accomplish? Help games sell me their "bundle of gems" faster? Developers simply do not have the incentive to build any other kinds of games when the current crop of addictive shovelware is so damn profita…

I mean…I don’t entirely agree, they’ve created an entire service to avoid the problems you are describing with Apple Arcade.

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#349

Post by wmf »

theshrike79 wrote: post #331
xp84 wrote: post #52

I'm excited for the most silly pedestrian reason: Because I detest the Apple 'DRM' chip that is implicit in Lightning even when used just for charging. I call it "DRM'd Electricity." Choices of cables we've had for the whole existence of the iPhone: • Apple cables, $20-30, not even nice, cheap plastic with poor strain relief, work reliably until they succumb easily to damage • Licensed (like Belkin), $20-30, nicer, w…

But now you'll get into the fun USB-C -land, where two USB-C cables can have wildly different capabilities with no external way to check it :) One cable might only support power, one might only be for data and one supports USB-PD up to 120W. How can you know? By trying them all!

Buy good cables and throw the others away. (You can't really trust any cable you didn't buy anyway because of O.MG.)

Re: Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max

#350

Post by armchairhacker »

paxys wrote: post #24
highwaylights wrote: post #3

The most interesting part of this to me isn't the titanium or the camera (impressive as it looks), it's the GPU. They made a point of saying that the GPU had been completely ground-up re-designed, and I assume they're intending to keep scaling that up over the next few iterations. They didn't talk about it for very long, but that the phone is able to convincingly run AAA games, even at playable if not great frame-rat…

Is it though? The promise of gaming on iPhone (and mobile gaming in general) has been taken over and destroyed by freemium games whose only goal is to push microtransactions. What is a marginally better GPU going to accomplish? Help games sell me their "bundle of gems" faster? Developers simply do not have the incentive to build any other kinds of games when the current crop of addictive shovelware is so damn profita…

> Developers simply do not have the incentive to build any other kinds of games when the current crop of addictive shovelware is so damn profitable.

Personally, I don’t have the incentive because 1) paid mobile gaming isn’t a big market (see: top paid apps being the exact same years-old, curated Apple apps not having many reviews/downloads), 2) there aren’t many options to develop games targeting iOS which also target Android and Windows/Linux (at least if you want to use Swift), and 3) Apple could remove my game at any notice and I don’t get 30% of the revenue.

If Apple introduces a way to easily port desktop games to iOS, or even develop entirely new games which can run on Linux and mac and iPhone, I think we’d see a lot more iOS games. Maybe the new GPU isn’t only faster but also supports Vulkan/wgpu better?

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