Virtual controls for touchscreen gaming.

Anyone else find virtual controls on mobile games totally fine? Sure it will never be better than physical controls but most handle fine after a short learning period. I still find it odd that game journalists all flip out when they hear the words 'virtual button/joystick'. Sure your fingers block the screen, so just stop looking at your fingers. Good mobile games know that your fingers are on the screen and tend not to have shit shooting at you from under your fingers.

Really the only time I had issue was when I got my iphone 3g, but it really didn't take more than a week or so to get a hang of. Same as learning a new gaming input method (protip: for virtual d-pads, go to options and turn the size to small if you can, and set your thumb as a pivot point on the d-pad and rock left/right/up/down, a lot easier than sliding around). And a lot of these games allow full UI customization for your needs.

Sure I'd rather play this stuff on my psp/ds, but I rarely carry those around with me and you eventually do reach a point in which you have to weigh better controls for a much more expensive game.

Thoughts?

Tags: iPhone, Portable Gaming, iPhone gaming, Portable

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Jason Lomberg

April 29, 2011

In my opinion, virtual controls are extremely inefficient. I've tried playing Pac-Man and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 on my iPhone, and the controls made them unbearable. UMK3 is just attrocious. I've never been so dissapointed with a Mortal Kombat game, and I remember playing MK2 on the Game Boy! The journalists are right to crap all over virtual controls--they obscure the screen and go against the iPhone's inherent strengths.

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Jeffrey Zhang

funny you mention 2 of the games with really bad controls. Mortal Kombat is horrible. I think I've reached the point in which I could just view the screenshots on itunes and have a good idea if the controls are good or enough.

Dan Davies

I find that the lack of tactile feedback is one of my main problems with touch buttons. I often loose track or slip off them, making them clunky to use. They can make for more complicated gameplay, but do however have to be done well. Chinatown Wars a good example, early FPSs like the first NOVA, not so much.

Games based around the iPhone strengths however (Infinity Blade) make for much smoother and more engaging experiences.

Chris Charlton

There are good virtual buttons and there are bad ones. The biggest issue comes with shoehorning entire console game control sets and movelists onto virtual buttons, meaning three or four fingers performing gymnastics on the screen at any one time. As Dan mentions, the best iphone games are the ones that are made with the medium in mind. I'd say Infinity Blade is a touch overrated, but have a look at superbrothers, if only because I've just written about it.

The inescapable truth is that the best iPhone games are the ones with simplified touchscreen controls *not* involving virtual buttons or joysticks. I'm thinking of Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, Battle Bears, Skee-Ball, and various other App/Games like i-Gun and Paper Toss.