Hi Nick, I appreciate your take on the Android verses iOS debate. For the most part I agree for someone like me investing into both platforms eventually would be the best thing from a business oriented point of view. Right now though I just need an accessible phone, and because I am going through a very costly divorce I don't have a lot of money to throw down for phones, tablets, whatever. I just need an accessible phone for a reasonable price. If I can get some accessible games to play on it all the better. Otherwise I'll just buy the least expensive phone I can get that offers decent accessibility. The way I see it I can always upgrade or buy a better phone whatever when I am financially back on my feet again.
Cheers! On 11/12/13, Dakotah Rickard <[email protected]> wrote: > Ok. I'm grabbing onto this topic a bit late, but here goes. > > I have used an iPhone 5 for a year now, and it's changed my life. I > grabbed up a cheap crappy Android device at the beginning of April > this year, but it ran I think Android 2.6, so it wasn't very fun. > Still, finding that I could actually use it gave me hope. About two > months ago, I bought a Nexus 7 FHD and have been slowly gaining in > both proficiency and respect for the Android platform. > > Here's my take on the main issue, games, with some sub-issues below. > > First, there's a game, Star Traders, which I really like. It's > available on both iOS and Android, though there are some slight > differences. The Android version does some odd stuff, but it's > useable. I haven't figured out how to make the ChoiceOfGames games > work, and I've tried several of them. I can't read the pages and I > can't seem to find the radio buttons, but if some people say they > work, they work. > > As for other games, the big problem is that the ExploreByTouch feature > of Android was added in 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, and some games were > developed before that, so you either have to turn off Explore By Touch > or suspend Talkback, Android's native screen reader. IOS offers the > triple click home command to enable and disable Voiceover, but Google > hasn't implemented anything like that for Talkback, so you have to do > a bit of fiddling to make it work. > > Finally, as for development, you're absolutely right. It is very > possible to make accessible apps on Android; it's just that most > people don't really bother. It can even be free to make said apps, > which is great. Why throw down cash if you don't have to. > However, to be fair to the iPhone, there are other options to buying a > Mac and learning Objective C. The easiest is using a port of C#, a > programming language with which you are either familiar or can easily > become familiar, as it's rather like Java. There are other options, > though they escape me for now. The port of C# does cost money, but > it's $400 or $450, I think, rather than thousands. > Also, there's the pickiness of Apple's App store, and the developers' > program charges, but it's a question. There are plenty of people using > Android devices successfully, as it's now a much more accessible > platform than it was, but the majority still use Apple's product > lines. That means that you'd maximize profits, even given the > additional costs, by going the iOS route. Still, if you go with > Android, you'll be putting little money down, eaning you can charge > less and still profit. > > In my humble opinion, the best solution would be play the fence, as > I'm doing. Essentially, if you can afford to do so, buy both. > > finally, some cautionary advice that you probably already know. > The most wonderful thing about Android is that it's got a lot of open > source elements, though some of the elements most crucial to Android > are being swallowed up by Google and made closed source. Android > transitions smoothly between various apps providing various functions, > whereas Apple has each app sandboxed, meaning that even a simple thing > like sending an email with an attachment is pretty nearly impossible. > However, Android is highly fragmented. Many, many people still use > older devices (before 4.0) with crappy accessibility and poor support. > The only devices which are guaranteed an update are Nexus devices, and > even these aren't sure things, as the recent drop of the Galaxy Nexus > shows. > > The safest bet, in my opinion, is to buy an iPhone and a Nexus tablet, > as I've done. First and foremost, they are both at the beginning of > their current tech cycles, and secondarily, this allows you to have > the portability of the iPhone for day to day tasks like calling and > navigation, but it allows you to have a dedicated amusement device in > the Nexus. Given that a new 16 GB nexus is $230 or so, and given that > a new 16 GB iPhone 5s is $200 or so on contract, you're throwing down > a little under $500 for the devices and gaining a foothold on both > markets. > > Still, whatever choice you make, I'm sure that great things are to come. > > I wish you luck. --- Gamers mailing list __ [email protected] If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to [email protected]. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to [email protected].
