Early in the platform’s life-long before the release of the Apple TV 4K – which has very attractive specifications for game development – Apple lifted the requirement that games support its controller. But the first impression had already been made. And even if developers could release games that required a controller, the lack of a controller bundle for games-minded Apple TV buyers meant that developers couldn’t feel confident they’d find a large audience that could play their games.
But there’s more going on here than just controller support. To find out more, we talked to the people who would have the most complete perspective on the Apple TV’s video game credentials.
Apple doesn’t understand games. It never has, and I doubt it ever will (at least, in the near future). People often like to point at iOS as a successful gaming platform, but I don’t count the endless string of gambling apps designed to prey on children and other willing people to really be games. If your gaming platform isn’t even popular enough for Minecraft, you don’t have a gaming platform.
I bought it many years ago and it’s just sitting there collecting dust. What’s the point of crapple tv in time of cheap smart tv era ? If I wanted apple-quality games then I’d just play on commodore 64.
Smart TV era? Does anyone still consider this a thing? For me, from pretty much one day to the next, the Chromecast made the TV “smart” software redundant. I to this day still have to see a TV where the software is not annoying. LG comes kinda close with their magic remote, but phone + cast is still so much faster, and unlike the remote, my phone tends to be near me when i need it. And unlike the software in the TV, i only need to replace an inexpensive dongle the moment it gets too out of date.
Chromecast is a horrendously implemented, single purpose piece of junk, which even worse, requires another device to function (if you don’t include a wifi router), in an incredibly restricted way. With a Smart TV (now ubiquitous, and insanely cheap) you can just turn on Netflix or Hulu (et cetera) or a web browser and get going. These things are not even remotely comparable.
It just works… All the apps i have where i would care about cast support have it, except one, (but because of that i will not become an Amazon Prime subscriber, not much of a loss though). If i for some reason need a web browser, i can just share my phone screen.
I guess it comes down to how you really see your phone, for me my phone is a super computer that i have in my pocket that also occasionally might be used for making calls. It has all the media consumption apps on it so i can use them no matter where i am, and if that place happens to be in front of my living room TV, i can easily cast to it. If i then decide to go to the bedroom instead i can just change the playback location, no turning on a TV and fiddling with it. We have multiple TVs of multiple brands and ages, i don’t have to treat them any differently, they all just work, because of the chromecast.
For three years.
Then the manufacturer forgets that TV existed and stops making firmware updates for it. Then all its root SSL certificates expire the the “smart” software is worse than useless: it’s in the way.
Do you recycle and replace your biggest TV every three years?
I can’t say my Apple TV is a very good device. The remote is kind of a disaster. Siri just wants to misspell your searches and sell you things. If not for the occasional iTunes video or Airplay mirroring, I’d definitely rather be on Roku. But relying on TV built-ins is entirely off the table: you need something that can run apps and receive updates.
I have a Sony Android TV. Would you consider that a ‘smart’ TV, or not?
I can run Kodi directly on the TV, and install cool stuff like emulators and games for the kids on it. I’d say it’s a very useful TV.
Granted it will go out of date though.
Yeah, it is pretty smart that it comes with a Chromecast built in instead of you having to buy one, plus it has a bonus feature that it can not only turn the TV on but also power it down again, and volume control, without the remote, works better
Good, because I don’t count the recent string of productivity apps designed to charge your credit card on a perpetual basis to be real apps either, but I digress.
Regarding this AppleTV thing; Never owned one, but with the horsepower it has, I figured Apple could’ve easily made a dent if they simply bundled a gaming controller and got some old “remastered” PS3/Xbox360 era console games on board. For the amount of money they’re charging for the thing (compared to the old AppleTV), you’d figure it’d only make sense to include a gaming controller if they really wanted to bring gamers on board. But hey, this is the new, fashionista Apple, so there’s a better chance we’ll see an AppleTV Hermes Edition with leather enclosure and gold buckles for the next iteration.
Edited 2018-10-15 15:08 UTC
Yeah, they really are missing a lot of tech opportunities these days, in pursuit of their fashion label. I miss the old computer company Apple.
New Apple is all about selling accessories, just like on the iDevices. So if they’d include a gaming controller, they wouldn’t make any money on the controller accessory.
Gambling games? Sounds like confusion with Android?
Sounds like you haven’t looked up how many ios gambling games there are in a long time. The list is never-ending.
Count me as another happy Chromecast user! In fact, I have two, one from the first generation that I bought as soon as they became available in my country and the newer one.
I will never EVER(!!!) go back to using the slow, buggy, error prone and that frequently is left without updates by the manufacturer “Smart TV” features available on most TVs these days.
Heck, recently I bought a Google Home Mini just to play with it and came out impressed with the fact that I can ask the damn thing to start streaming some Netflix show or a Youtube podcast directly on the TV, no remote interaction whatsoever required!
Not to mention that the Chromecast works great with things like Popcorn Time, I can stream torrented movies and TV shows using the Videostream extension and those… erm… less-reputable websites with all kinds of bootleg content for which there is no official support whatsoever on any device/app/appliance but works fine on a web browser.
Thanks but no thanks. You can keep your buggy, limited, “curated” “Smart TV” features.
Edited 2018-10-16 15:53 UTC
Not me. I don’t need Google to know, nor approve, what services I choose to stream. Count me out! At least Airplay, both the old version 1 and the new version 2, require only that you be on the same LAN to work. No middlemen watching what you do, nor saying that you can’t play your Audible books because Google and Amazon got pissy with one another.