3g posts

For decades, Mac owners have had to sigh dispiritedly when assessing their gaming options compared to what has been available for the PC. Development studios like Bungie and Blizzard aside, most gaming houses have always decided to create their games for the larger market share, which have always been PC-based. While there have been successful ports of PC games from studios like Aspyr, these have always arrived much later than the launch of the original versions.

Later, a slew of Mac-dedicated studios appeared on the scene (see last week's MacMonday, which focused on Freeverse) and have proven that not only is it possible to create great games for the Mac, but to be successful at the task. This has helped energize the Mac gaming community and is undoubtedly a good thing, but a recent arrival to the Mac lineup of products has added a new element that ought to be considered. In this post we'll talk about how the iPhone could affect developing games for the Mac.

Right before announcing the iPhone 3G, Apple, Inc., CEO Steve Jobs asked a rather innocuous question: "Why do you want 3G?"

That question could do with a bit of tweaking, Mr. Jobs. How about: Why wouldn't we want a 3G?

Set to debut on July 11, a scant time after the iPhone's first birthday, the 3G will be sleeker, more affordable, and faster than its predecessor -- and most other phones. To demonstrate the 3G's speed increase, Jobs fired up its browser, which loaded significantly faster than the original iPhone, and "36% faster than the nokia N95 and Treo 750."

Because everyone's time is always of the essence, Jobs happily divulged battery statistics such as "3G talk time... other phones have 3 - 3.5 hours, we've managed 5 hours of 3G talk time, which is an industry-leading amount of time." Users will be able to browse the web for five to six hours, watch video for seven hours, and listen to audio for a staggering 24 hours.

Striving to cut down on the number of gadgets most of us have to take on road trips, the 3G will be equipped with a GPS unit. As a general overview, Jobs reminded attendees of the apps created by the SDK earlier in the presentation, as well as full Exchange and VPN support.

As if checking off items on a list, Jobs broached the affordable nature of the iPhone -- or, to some, its rather unaffordable nature. "We think the iPhone 3G will be affordable to almost everyone," Jobs said. "[A] 16GB model for $299 ... The big news, is $399 to $199 [for an 8GB model]."

The iPhone 3G will be available on July 11. Where can you get one, you ask? "We'll be rolling it out in 70 countries in the next severeal months," said Jobs. "Next time you're in Malta and you need an iPhone 3G, it'll be there for ya."

[Thanks to Engadget for live coverage of WWDC.]