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Home / News / iOS and Android games more popular than Sony and Nintendo handhelds

iOS and Android games more popular than Sony and Nintendo handhelds

Mobile phone gaming has wiped the floor with handheld consoles – is this the future?

A quick look about on the train could have told you smartphone gaming is more popular than handheld consoles, but who would have though iOS and Android are beating Sony and Nintendo’s combined efforts so convincingly? According to Flurry research, iOS and Android will own 58 per cent of the mobile gaming world by the end of the year – that’s a 34 per cent increase since last year.

But with new phones – like the big-screened Samsung Galaxy Note – out regularly and constant game releases amazing us weekly, it’s little wonder the stagnant 3DS and PSP are flagging.

Will the release of the Sony Playstation Vita – if it ever actually happens – be the saviour of mobile consoles? Having joysticks and buttons certainly helps, but smartphone convenience and cheap pricing might just be too good to ignore. With joysticks for iPads already here and gadget convergence clearly a thing of the future – with the likes of the Asus Transformer Prime proving the point – it’s time for console manufacturers to start thinking outside the box, or get ready to die inside it.

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Profile image of Dan Grabham Dan Grabham Editor-in-Chief

About

Dan is Editor-in-chief of Stuff, working across the magazine and the Stuff.tv website.  Our Editor-in-Chief is a regular at tech shows such as CES in Las Vegas, IFA in Berlin and Mobile World Congress in Barcelona as well as at other launches and events. He has been a CES Innovation Awards judge. Dan is completely platform agnostic and very at home using and writing about Windows, macOS, Android and iOS/iPadOS plus lots and lots of gadgets including audio and smart home gear, laptops and smartphones. He's also been interviewed and quoted in a wide variety of places including The Sun, BBC World Service, BBC News Online, BBC Radio 5Live, BBC Radio 4, Sky News Radio and BBC Local Radio.

Areas of expertise

Computing, mobile, audio, smart home