Epic Games still not sold on Android

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Hardware and marketplace fragmentation hold back Infinity Blade dev

Epic Games has been regarded as one of the most forward-looking development companies for PC gaming, and now it is making big strides in the world of mobile games. But for now, its focus is heavily set on the iPhone, becauseeven though it can bring its powerful development tools to Android, it's not entirelycomfortable diving head-firstinto Google's OS just yet.

Then, faster than most expected, it made the same development platform available on Android and released a tech demo called Epic Citadel. Still, Epic Vice President Jay Wilbur isn't totally sold. The full version of Epic Citadel will be available for iOS first, and after that, thecompany will "start considering Android," he said in an interview withThe Slowdown.

"One of the problems with the Android marketplace is hardware fragmentation, that’s a really big issue. The other thing is marketplace fragmentation, there are so many different appstores out there. The Android marketplace is a little more difficult [to develop for] because there is less control. I think the Android marketplace is robust … I find it very easy to buy things on it, it’s just that Apple has very tight control. So anything in the Apple world is perfect. It’s just perfect. We like that, we like that a lot. We know that it’s just gonna work,"said Wilbur.

Unlike iOS, which runs on only Apple devices with clear specifications, Android runs on many different pieces of hardware. Google is also less strict about the contents of its app store.

[Source:Slowdown.vg]

Jan 25, 2011