Unfortunately, this is still a problem, but it's completely invisible unless you're actively looking for stuff like this. Browse the Games section, read mobile-focused sites, and stick to the mobile gaming OTs and community threads, and you will never ever see clones or those other apps
Much like how you won't ever see the hundreds of thousands of flash games or first-time prototypes and so on on PC if you stick to PC sites, the Steam thread, and Popular New Releases on Steam
Ok...that screenshot shows me info I already knew, and it does little to solve my problem. It's just a few curated or editor's choice lists of titles on iOS. Then the generic genre categories, and some top popular or grossing charts. The only meaningful additions Apple has added over the years is segregating out paid games, and replacing "free" with "get" for price on F2P games. Not to mention none of this addresses my point about "accurately learning about my consumption habits or taste", because curated lists and top charts don't learn/adapt to what
I like. I own a few games on my old iphone 4s, more on my current Samsung Galaxy S5, and neither service is recommending me useful content based on what I own or like. That's my biggest problem with Google and Apple, they're tools and solutions to this discovery issue aren't unique, they're not fleshed out, they don't or suck at adapting to what I already consume, and they're weaker than multiple other companies.
Valve gets crap for not doing enough with Steam, yet they've at least
attempted multiple tools to deal with the influx of games on top of everything in that iOS screenshot. I have recommended lists and an endless discovery queue that react to what games I buy, what games I recommend to others, my playtime in certain games, what my friends recommend, games similar to stuff in my wishlist, and games that fit into a user-generated tagging system with stuff I already own/like. My wishlist will inform me of game pricing changes, I have an activity feed that displays patches/DLC for games I "follow". On top of all that, they still have a better approach to curation, because it's not from
one source. Baked into Steam, I have a list of curators constantly recommending new content, and I can follow the few ones that
align with my taste in games.
Other good digital ecosystems like Amazon or Netflix work similarly. I can't keep up with every Netflix release, and while the "featured" or editor's choice list they'll show to everyone has
some use...it's their automated tools reacting to what I favorite, 4-5 star, and what others consume that lead me to fun new stuff. Google Play/iOS by comparison are just garbage. Steam, Netflix and Amazon just have better tools to help me discover fun content, and they did all that work despite having less content coming out each day to deal with. Gamasutra back in 2015 pointed out that iOS had 500 game (
just games) submissions a DAY. If you do the math, iOS gets more games in one year, than Steam has altogether now. It's not a
maybe that good games will get buried or unnoticed, it's a
fact they do, and contributes to why more articles on gameindustry.biz note mobile dev failures than console or PC.
I think it's fine to complain how iOS/Google Play don't make content discovery as easy as other digital storefronts, rather than having to rely on outside sites/tastemakers to pick up the slack. It's not like Apple or Google are poorer than Valve or Netflix.
Each and EVERY site you just listed was already a tastemaker in 2012, with the exceptions of I don't know know the level of mobile coverage Killscreen and GAF provided then. My point still stands that I've not seen lots of new tastemakers come to the table for mobile in the last 5 years. Even places like youtube + twitch feature less new mobile tastemakers vs. new ones entering the already crowded PC/console space. The more tastemakers you have, the more chances all these games from big to small get covered, and that info circulates.
Paid premium games release every week, without fail. They're not hard to find. You literally just have to go to the App Store. They're right there, in Games, with big banners and recommended by curated lists
I could've worded that part better, because my point was that paid premium games are rare compared to F2P releases now, when in the early days of mobile a higher percentage of games were paid vs. F2P. I think it's fair to say F2P has become the dominant business model on the platform, and plenty of devs have noted the difficulties in selling games with a pay up front price tag. Tons of articles have been made about bad F2P business practices, and how F2P has effected the prices of paid premium games. Hell, the devs behind Monument Valley noted complaints for daring to charge $2 for an expansion that cost them half a million to make, and the huge uptick in sales after they got editor's choice...not something
every dev gets even if their game is rated well elsewhere.
I've typed too much already, but I still feel my arguments/problems with mobile gaming are valid, especially when it comes to release frequency and content discovery. Games get lost on PC/Console despite better tools, less release frequency and more tastemakers...so yeah Google/Apple could do more to improve mobile gaming, and I think they need to as more content keeps releasing.
