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Posts tagged with "app store"

Apple Highlights Indie Games in New Permanent Storefront

In a continuation of its current promotion of indie games, the App Store has now added a new section dedicated to featuring indie titles.

Chelsea Stark of Polygon adds:

The section kicked off today and will run indefinitely, according to Apple, featuring new games daily, along with highlighting older titles. The games are a mix of free-to-play and paid titles, all selected by the same editorial team that has been highlighting games through the App Store’s history.

The indie games section can be accessed by tapping the ‘Celebrating Indie Games’ banner at the top of the App Store. Currently it includes featured columns like:

  • Our 25 favorite indie games
  • Indie game debuts
  • Newly discovered indies
  • Indie greats: 99¢ for a limited time
  • Indie games celebrate innovation…

This new dedicated hub for indie games is available on the tvOS App Store as well, highlighting the kind of quality games that are available not only on Apple’s mobile devices, but also its television platform.

Though Apple has stated that the indie games section will be a permanent fixture, it’s unclear at this point in what location it will live on. After the current indie promotion ends, will it remain as the top featured banner a while? Or in another featured banner further down on the App Store page? We’ll have to wait and see. In any case though, in an App Store that’s often dominated by big players, it’s exciting to see extra attention pointed toward indies.

Indie Game Promotion Takes Over App Store

The App Store looks a little different today. If you opened it and thought you accidentally landed on the Games category page, it would be understandable. But that’s not what’s happening. Instead, Apple has launched a major promotion of the finest indie games available on iOS. According to the App Store Games Twitter account, the promotion is running for the next twelve days.

There are many classics featured: Super Hexagon, Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery, Monument Valley, Severed, Her Story, and Space Age to name just a few standouts. In addition to indie classics, the banner across the top of the App Store is promoting Mushroom 11 a new game by Untame that looks great, though I haven’t had a chance to try it yet.

The sheer volume of games on the App Store can make the choices feel overwhelming at times. That’s why it’s great to see Apple spotlighting the very best indie games available on iOS. With 12 days to go in the promotion, I expect it will be worth revisiting Apple’s picks. There are currently some gaps in some of the categories highlighted that I expect will fill in with more games as the promotion continues.

iOS 10.3 to Standardize In-App Review Prompts, Developers to Gain Ability to Respond to Customer Reviews

With today’s release of the first iOS 10.3 beta for developers, Apple announced two changes that have been highly requested by iOS users and the developer community. iOS 10.3 will offer a developer API to standardize how apps can ask users to rate an app or write a review on the App Store, and developers will get the ability to directly respond to customer reviews on both the iOS and Mac App Store.

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The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth Released on iOS

The long-anticipated iOS version of The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth is now available on the App Store roughly one year after it was rejected by Apple. Isaac is a rogue-like, dungeon crawler game that was originally released in 2014 by indie game studio Nicalis. Apple rejected the iOS version of Isaac in early 2016 for depicting violence against children. Late yesterday, the game appeared on the App Store with a 17+ rating.

Apple isn’t the first platform owner to reject Isaac. In 2012, Nintendo initially blocked Isaac from its 3DS eShop, but ultimately relented, publishing the game for the 3DS and Wii U.

The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth is available on the App Store for $14.99.

Facebook and Google Dominate the List of 2016’s Top Apps→

Sarah Perez, writing for TechCrunch:

Mobile applications from Facebook and Google dominated the new list of the year’s top apps released today by Nielsen. Not surprisingly, Facebook again grabbed the number one spot on the list, with more than 146 million average unique users per month, and 14 percent growth over last year. In fact, Facebook scored several spots on the top 10 chart, thanks to Messenger (#2) and Instagram (#8) – the latter which also showed some of the highest year-over-year growth, up 36 percent from 2015.

Messenger came in second place this year, with over 129 million average unique monthly users, followed by YouTube with over 113 monthly uniques.

However, it was Google, not Facebook, that grabbed the most spots on the year-end chart.

I assume that Nielsen’s study accounts for both the App Store and Google Play Store (iOS and Android apps), but their findings match the general state of the iOS App Store’s top charts. Notably, the only Apple-made app to make it into the Top 10 is Apple Music, which launched in June 2015 and has 20 million paying subscribers, though Nielsen reports over 68 million “average unique users” for it (Free users? Non-subscriber usage? Family accounts? I’d love to know their methodology for this).

See also, from two years ago: No Ecosystem Is an Island.

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Record App Store Results Reported by Apple→

Apple announced today that the App Store smashed records in 2016 and on New Year’s Day. App developers earned $20 billion in 2016, up 40% from 2015. In addition, on New Year’s Day Apple set a single-day App Store record when customers spent $240 million on apps.

Phil Schiller, senior Vice President of Worldwide Marketing had this to say:

2016 was a record-shattering year for the App Store, generating $20 billion for developers, and 2017 is off to a great start with January 1 as the single biggest day ever on the App Store. We want to thank our entire developer community for the many innovative apps they have created — which together with our products — help to truly enrich people’s lives.

Apple revealed that Super Mario Run, the much anticipated game from from Nintendo, was the number one most downloaded app on both Christmas Day and New Year’s Day. Apple’s Apps for Earth and Games for (RED) campaigns also raised over $17 million for charity in 2016 and app subscription billings increased 75% in 2016.

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Apple Publishes Best of 2016 App Store Lists

Today, Apple unveiled the 2016 edition of its annual Best of App Store lists for iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Apple TV. The lists highlight the best apps and games released by third-party developers on each platform during the past year.

The top picks this year for each platform are Prisma (iPhone), Sketchbook Motion (iPad), Bear (Mac), MySwimPro (Apple Watch), and Twitter (Apple TV). The games of the year are Clash Royale (iPhone), Severed (iPad), Life is Strange (Mac), Field Day (Apple Watch), and Riptide: GP Renegade (Apple TV).

In addition, this year Apple published lists of the ‘10 Best Apps of the Year’ and ‘10 Best Games of the Year’ on the iOS App Store and Apple TV App Store, and an extended list of the ‘Best Apps & Games of 2016’ on the Mac App Store.

Like last year, Apple has picked a mix of paid and free apps from developers big and small. Among the notable indie picks are apps from Shiny Frog, Devolver Digital, and Drinkbox Studios. A recap of all the winners and runners-up (from the US App Store) and links to MacStories reviews where applicable is available below.

iPhone

App of the Year

Prisma

Runner-Up

MSQRD

Game of the Year

Clash Royale

Runner-Up

Reigns (MacStories review)

iPad

App of the Year

Sketchbook Motion

Runner-Up

Bear (MacStories review)

Game of the Year

Severed (MacStories review)

Runner-Up

Chameleon Run

Mac

App of the Year

Bear

Game of the Year

Life is Strange

Apple Watch

App of the Year

MySwimPro

Game of the Year

Field Day

Apple TV

App of the Year

Twitter

Game of the Year

Riptide GP: Renegade

App Review Downtime Announced→

Each year around the Christmas holiday, Apple’s App Review team takes a break from reviewing the thousands of apps that pour into the App Store on a typical day. During the break, new apps and app updates are not accepted. This year is no different. According to Apple’s Developer news site:

The busiest season on the App Store is almost here. Make sure your apps are up-to-date and ready for the winter holidays. New apps and app updates will not be accepted December 23 to 27 (Pacific Time), so any releases should be submitted, approved, and scheduled in advance. Other iTunes Connect and developer account features will remain available.

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Apple’s App Store Cleanup Now Underway→

Sarah Perez, writing for TechCrunch, on Apple’s previously announced App Store cleanup:

Earlier this year, Apple promised it would clean up its iOS App Store by removing outdated, abandoned apps, including those that no longer meet current guidelines or don’t function as intended. That great App Store purge now appears to be underway, according to new data from app intelligence firm Sensor Tower. The company found that app removals increased by 238 percent in October 2016, with mobile games seeing the most deletions.

And:

That seems to have changed in October, when 47,300 apps were removed from the App Store, Sensor Tower discovered.

And while it’s true that Apple does delete apps on a regular basis, this figure is around 3.4 times higher than the monthly average of 14,000 for the months of January through September. (See chart below).

I long wondered if Apple would provide alternative ways for developers to preserve their old games for posterity. The answer, sadly, is much simpler: if you don’t update your app, it’ll be removed. I’m afraid we’re going to lose some historic App Store titles because of this, but I also see why it’s good for the average customer and the right thing to do at this point.

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