iPhone 3G S Graphics To Rival PSP Games?

Still not convinced of the iPhone 3G S as a serious gaming platform?  According to at least one game developer, it's time you change your mind.

Michael Schade, head of mobile game developer Fishlabs, says the OpenGL ES 2.0 support available on the iPhone 3G S pushes the machine's 3D graphics capabilities past that of the PSP.  That's right - it's equipped to handle better visuals than Sony's dedicated handheld console (not to mention a faster 600MHz processor compared to the PSP Go's 412MHz), essentially living up to developer expectations of a competent gaming phone.

Of course, being "equipped" doesn't equal being ready.  According to Id Software's John Carmack, the 3G S definitely has the potential, although the feature is not yet ready for primetime.  The well-known creator of "Doom" and "Quake" was quick to point out that there are software inefficiencies that may defer taking full advantage of the hardware's strengths, at least for the time being.   In fact, Carmack refused to take advantage of the new feature with the upcoming Doom Resurrection for the iPhone, which is still based on OpenGL ES 1.1.

In his interview with Pocket Gamer, Schade stressed that apps working with 2.0 technology will need to be designed from scratch, making it a costly outlay for game studios.   Add in the fact that the older iPhone 3G cannot play the same games (even at lower settings) and you've got a very risky investment.  With the hardware available and plenty of 3G S units expected to fly off the shelves, however, it's not too far-fetched to imagine companies taking more kindly to investing development dollars to turn out the highest-end graphics they can produce.

Looking into the future, I can't imagine the iPhone (with the 3G S and future iterations) not owning a bigger slice of the handheld gaming pie.  Apple already has the distribution infrastructure and an ever-growing consumer base; if they can figure out a better way to get the word out on iPhone games, my money is on the likelihood that it's a done deal, give or take a couple of years.  Are Nintendo and Sony really just going to take that lying down?

Photo Credit: iPhone Spies