Today marks the release of iOS 5 and it’s more than 200 new features, but if you’re a game designer there should be one of them that excites you more than any other, AirPlay.
AirPlay is Apple’s new connection between an iPad 2 or iPhone 4s and an Apple TV. With it you can stream anything that you see or hear on your device to your HDTV wirelessly and, in typical Apple fashion, easily. While currently this is limited to the subset of users who own an Apple TV I don’t believe Apple has any intention of limiting it to their own hardware and expect that you’ll soon see TVs that come with AirPlay as a built-in feature. And once the use of AirPlay starts to proliferate among the massive iOS userbase I believe we’ll start to see a huge shift in how people approach gaming, both mobile and in the home.
This is, in fact, almost the exact kind of situation that I predicted in my ‘The Future of All Gaming Could Be Mobile’ post from the beginning of the year. Starting today you can be out on the go and fling some Angry Birds or beat a few levels of IncrediBlox and then come home, sit down on the couch with you phone and start playing Dead Space, Real Racing, or Scribblenauts on your HDTV wirelessly. You don’t need to have a ‘real’ console sitting at home collecting dust and waiting for you to use it. You can take your entertainment with you wherever you go and always have the best experience based on your surroundings.
Beyond just brining mobile gaming to the big screen AirPlay also allows other exciting new possibilities. Firemint, the guys behind Flight Control and Real Racing, have recently announced a new multiplayer mode for Real Racing 2 called Party Play. Not only can you sit down on the couch and play Real Racing 2 HD in 1080p on your HDTV but you can host a 4 player split screen race with your friends playing on their iPhones or iPads!
What’s really amazing about all of this is that it’s only the beginning. On day one we have the ability to pull off 4 player split screen over a wireless connection, there is no telling what could come next. The possibilities of multi-screen gaming are very interesting and there is really no limit to the imaginative game designs we’ll see spring from this technology. It’s this rapid technological advancement and broad development community that will continue to push mobile gaming to the forefront and that is ushering in the future of all gaming. In case you couldn’t tell, I’m really excited to be a part of it.
