Geek Native follows phone tech because it touches on the lives of gamers around the world and because phones have become gaming platforms. This week there are rumours Google is developing an Android based gaming console. If that’s true Google will be late to the party with devices like the GameStick and the Ouya already here.
Android based gaming consoles won’t detract from the smartphone itself being a platform. It’s easy to look at the Xperia Z Ultra with its huge 6.4″ screen and see why it could work well as a platform. This is a smartphone you can easily hold in two hands. In fact, the question is whether it’s too big to be considered a phone at all. It’s only just smaller than Google’s Nexus 7, a tablet, that’s 7″. No one Sony’s provided a bluetooth phone extension for their… er, phone.
Even if computer games aren’t your thing then there’s reason to look at the Sony Xperia Z Ultra with gamer eyes. I use my Nexus 7 an awful lot for taking notes in the game (Evernote and Google Drive are my two top tips) and I’ve played in games where character sheets were entirely electronic. My smartphone feels too small for that. It’s too much of a fiddle. I say that having a large HTC One.
It may be that Xperia Z Ultra isn’t just used for character sheets and note taking. We’re seeing more and more electronic versions of tabletop rule sets coming out. They’re so much cheaper than print and much easier to keep up to date. It isn’t just the cost that is driving the demand, ebook RPGs are convenient and as gamers grow their collection of micro tablets or super large smartphones I suspect we’ll see more ebooks optimised for the small screen.
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