Mobile gaming is huge right now. Since smartphones and tablets were first released 8 years ago, people across the world have cottoned on to just how good mobile gaming is. Bored on your break? Nothing to do during your commute? Want to relax of an evening? Mobile games are always ready to come to the rescue! Within the mobile market two operating systems are currently vying for dominance; Google's Android system and Apple's iOS. Right now, the two operating systems (OS) control a 47.5% and 41.9% share of the market, respectively, and evidently they are both good systems, but when it comes to gaming which appeals to gamers the most?
First, let's look at the games being downloaded on the systems. On the Apple store the top games among users are Mortal Combat X, Trivia Crack, Clash Of Clans, Candy Crush and 8 Ball Pool. Android gamers, on the other hand, enjoy playing Lego Star Wars, Modern Combat 5: Blackout, Candy Crush, AdVenture Capitalist and Hay Day. As we can see, there's practically no difference between the two systems. Gamers are a diverse bunch, and it seems that whatever systems you use, the games you play (in terms of genre, content and player number) are likely to be the same.
This is likely due to the fact that most developers, wants to get the highest possible user numbers for their particular game, will release apps on both systems. Browser-based games, such as Slotsheaven, are now available only on desktops but soon will be geared towards both Apple and Google camps, allowing anyone to play from whichever handset they currently own.
So what about the phones themselves? Are certain handsets geared towards gamers more than others? Taking the two top handsets for each OS, the iPhone 6 and Samsung Galaxy S6, we can see a clear divide. The iPhone 6 comes with the super-fast A8 processor, quad core GPU and 1GB of RAM, compared to the Galaxy S6's slightly faster Coretex-A57 processor, quad core GPU and 3GB of RAM. The differences aren't severe, but one can safely say that the top of the line Android device does pack a fairly greater punch than it's iOS competitor. Though the secifications look a lot skewed in favor of the Android smartpones, Apple’s offerings are powerful enough to play all the games that developers build for the platform. The fact that game devs for Apple only have to optimize the game for a select few devices, which is not the case while developing in Android smartphones. Whilst most mobile games are still rather basic, uncomplicated titles, as more high definition 3D games are released for the systems one can see that the Android could have the upper hand. The issue remains though - there are hundreds of different Android handsets from a multitude of different manufacturers, so any overarching comparison is rather difficult to make.
Which OS is better for gamers then? Well, the fact of the matter is that if you want to game in the best manner possible, pick whichever operating system you feel most comfortable with! Phone capabilities are similar and game releases inclusive enough not to merit picking one over the other, and it's likely to stay that way for the foreseeable future.
Which OS do you like playing on most? Let us know below!
