An Exploration of the Mobile Gaming Ecosystem from Developers’ Perspective - The Video Game Industry: Formation, Present State, and Future - page 68

smartphones using this operating system, an application store and the cor-
responding SDK). In the case of Nokia the model was partly in place before
the iPhone introduction into the market, and it included its own hand-
sets, the Symbian operating system for mobile devices and the Ovi services
and application store. However, the Ovi store was shut down and Sym-
bian transferred to Accenture during 2011 after the alliance of Nokia with
Microsoft. Until 2010, according to Gartner data, Nokia was the world
leader in sales with 37.6 per cent of the market share. However, according
to IDC, Android devices had grown to control more than 40 per cent of the
global smartphone market by the end of 2011, surpassing Nokia.
Tablets, a new segment started in April 2010 with the launch of Apple's
iPad, are worth considering separately as providers of a dif erent gameplay
experience from that of a smartphone. With its wider, full-colour touch-
screen display and processing power, tablets deliver graphics on par with
traditional console gaming platforms, adding motion-sensitive controls and
mobile/wireless broadband connectivity. In fact, gaming dominates tablets
user interaction. According to Nielsen research, 3 62 per cent of all iPad
owners have purchased premium games, more than any other iPad paid
app category. As of November 2010 games represented half of the top ten
applications on the iPad's “Paid Apps” best-seller countdown, led by titles
like Angry Birds and Plants vs. Zombies , and according to analytics fi rm
Distimo 4 games represented 35 per cent of all iPad titles. The dif erences
are also notorious in gameplay between the iPhone and iPad. Mobclix
reports 5 that gaming sessions on the iPad typically run three times longer
than the same title on the iPhone, breaking one of the main limits in mobile
gaming—the casual gaming while killing time—and opening new oppor-
tunities for innovation.
Application stores, the next element in these new platforms, are the
main novelty from the mobile domain in comparison with online games
through Internet or conventional video games. The fi rst of them, Apple's
App Store virtual storefront, was launched in July 2008 in conjunction
with the U.S. retail debut of the iPhone 3G. Initially it featured about fi ve
hundred applications, including educational programs, mobile commerce
and business productivity tools, with games representing about a third of
these “fi rst-wave” applications. It was an instant—and somewhat unex-
pected—success. The percentage of games with regard to the total number
of applications has been steadily declining: 23 per cent in April 2009, 18
per cent in March 2010. Using data from Pinch Media 6 and Flurry 7 total
revenues for game developers and publishers on the Apple platform were
around $200 million until the end of 2009. In average, a premium App
Store download averaged $12,100 in revenue ($8,500 net to the developer
and publisher), generating an estimated $20 million per month in game rev-
enues, whereas the average price of the game category was $1.36. Google
launched its application store, Android Market, in October 2008 and the
corresponding processes for charging, billing and sharing revenues with