Capcom is up to something we think it’s not such a bad idea. Resident Evil 4 will soon be available for iPhone and iPod Touch in serialised episodes.

Dubbed Resident Evil 4: For Beginners, the game contains the first two chapters of Resident Evil 4 for iPhone as well as a new tutorial level. Additionally, the game offers a new “Beginner” difficulty setting, one new “shooting gallery” mini game and three mercenary missions. Players will be able to download the remaining Resident Evil 4 chapters as DLC, if they wish to continue the journey. Customers that have already purchase the full game will receive the added features in a free update.

Featuring high-resolution 3D graphics and intuitive context sensitive Multi-Touch controls, Resident Evil 4 for iPhone allows gamers to experience one of the most thrilling chapters of the Resident Evil saga in an all new way. Engage in running gun fights against crowds of enemies utilizing Resident Evil 4’s intuitive tap interface. The new location based damage system allows the player to blast enemies in their legs to slow them down or in the head for a quick kill. Additionally, context sensitive controls pop up as needed allowing the player to perform complex actions with a tap of the button. Players can climb ladders, equip binoculars and jump out windows with the touch of an icon.

Resident Evil 4: For Beginners for the iPhone and iPod touch is now available for $.99 (great pricing) from the App Store. For additional information check the capcom site.

When did you last hear that a Car is launched through a video game….Yes that is happening and No it’s not happening with NFS. Volkswagen is thinking out of the box & using the power of games to promote it. They have decided to launch the new 2010 GTI Volkswagen through the iPhone platform.

Volkswagen has a game created by Firemint known as Real Racing GTI which is available as free download. With this are giving hands-on (literally) experience. Now one can experience every aspect of the new car through the app available for their iPhones and at the same time challenging players with the reward being winning a real 2010 GTI.

Unluckily this contest is for US only it still impresses us

Over the two year period that I have spent blogging and writing about gaming, I’ve been approached by a lot of people who wanted to get into game development. The typical questions I’ve faced are, how do I start off in the industry, is there any course I need to take, which is best college in India that teaches game development among others. I generally end up telling them to stick to basics, understand art design/coding language involved better and then search for specialised courses for the same.

Though gaming has evolved a lot over the years, from 2D scrollers to present-gen realistic graphics based games, the basics are still the same, well almost. What has really evolved are the ideas. Most games try to bring in something new to the market — a new way to play it, a new way to interact with the environment, a different way of story telling, multiple endings or even vast environments which you can explore forever!

If you ask me today how to start off as a game development, I would point my fingers towards iPhone, iPod Touch platform. You may not be able to develop a next Doom on it, nor will you be able to make the game with the best graphics ever. What you can do, is concentrate on the basics and utilise the platform to the maximum to develop a game that is easy to pick up and play and thoroughly enjoyable.

Another reason why I suggest this platform’s also because it’s easier to make a return as you won’t need to depend on distributing the game and piracy. I spoke to Rohit Gupta, who with a friend started Rolocule and developed the first Squash game for the platform — Touch Squash. He told us how he went about developing the app, the motivation, know-how among others. Read on…

Have you developed games in the past?

Yes, I have worked on “The Sims 3″ for PC while I was at Electronic Arts (EA) in Redwood Shores, California, USA. I have also developed couple of games while I was pursuing my Master of Science (MS) in Computer Science at Columbia University, New York, USA.

What motivated you to develop the app?
We are a game development startup and in developing our first game, I wanted to do something that was never done before. I love squash as a sport but the principal limitation has always been the difficulty in observing the sport as a spectator, either in person or on television. Enjoying squash through the medium of interactive entertainment like a Squash 3D sports video game looked perfect.

Secondly, my focus was developing a powerful game with high quality graphics. Developing games for mobile phones was clearly out of picture because of their less processing power. Since we are a startup, it is also not easy to directly jump to making games for consoles or PC because of the many complexities involved. iPhone gave us the perfect platform to showcase what we can do. It is way ahead of any mobile phone as a gaming device in terms of technology. iPhone’s powerful processor gave excellent graphics and ability to develop great gameplay in the game – exactly the way I wanted.
Also, Touch Squash looked perfect since I want to build our game development company on the foundation of creativity, innovation and originality which is deeply missing in Indian game development companies today.

How much time did you spend developing it? What was the most difficult part of developing the game?
It took me 3 months to develop the game. With no experience developing for either iPhone or Mac OS X, it was a completely new world and I wanted to make sure that the game matched the standards of our big brothers (big game developers) on the App Store.
Secondly, incorporating real physics into the game was a real challenge. To make the game look realistic and natural, it was very important for the game to follow all the Newton’s laws of motion, kinetic energy, potential energy, etc. Simulating the real world in a computer language gave a god-like feeling and this was actually the best part of the entire development.

What knowledge is required to develop an iPhone game? (which all languages should one know) What is the investment required?
Knowledge of C, Objective C, object oriented programming, OpenGL (for 3D games) will suffice. However, it is also important to have some art and UI background. Art and UI play a very important role when it comes to developing applications for iPhone.
You need a computer running Macintosh operating system Mac OS X (Macbook or iMac), an iPhone/iPod touch and you should be registered in Apple’s iPhone Developer program (Standard program costs $99).

Do you plan to make the game for other similar platforms life Nintendo DSi or even Wii?
Yes, we do have plans to make games on DSi and Wii.

What is the level of complexity in comparison to let’s say making a flash game
Complexity actually varies between 2D and 3D games. Developing a 2D game for iPhone won’t be very different as compared to a flash game. However, complexity increases 5 to 10 times when you develop a 3D game for iPhone.

How many time was the app downloaded?
In first 3 months since the launch of Touch Squash, tens of thousands of people across 50+ countries are playing the game and this is just a beginning.

How much money can one expect to make of a decent app on iPhone?
There are close to 85,000 apps on the App Store, with many of them made very nicely and are very decent. So, it is very important to stand out of the crowd to get notice first.
Each app performs differently depending upon the popularity it gains in the App Store. The amount of money that one can make on the App Store varies from million of dollars to few hundred dollars. It all depends on how you pull it off.

Also read: My story in DNA newspaper on iPhone gaming

What do you do if you want to play PC games using an iPhone? You heard me right, playing PC games with your iPhone. On any normal day you would say – Just forget it – and get back to gaming. But two guys from Delhi thought different. They developed an app -  iMO – which lets you control games using an iPhone app. They presented it today at TC50, you can see the video below.

But this is not the first time someone has tried to control PC games using iPhone an Israeli-American company had tried to do something like this, but it was more of streaming the game than taking advantage of the accelerometre in the iPhone. Kudos to you guys and hopefully you guys will make such apps.Cheers!

Now enjoy the video

Link via Pluggd.in

Word in Apple that the new iPod Nano, which sports a camera, a mic for recording and speakers, announced today, will be available in India in two weeks time. It features 2.2″ screen, built in FM radio and iTunes tagging.

The new iPod nano is available today in an 8GB model for Rs.9,400 (MRP) and a 16GB model for Rs.11,200, and comes in nine colours including silver, black, purple, blue, green, orange, yellow, red and pink.

iPod Touch now officially a PSP competitor

Just  edge-online noted here, Apple is pushing iPod Touch as a gaming device. Evident from the way it was described in the press release.

iPod touch is a great game player with its built-in accelerometer, revolutionary Multi-Touch user interface, its amazing graphics performance and the over 20,000 game and entertainment titles available on the App Store. With support for peer-to-peer connections, the new iPod touch gives users the ability to play multi-player games with people next to them or around the world. iPod touch customers can add new game titles from the App Store over Wi-Fi anytime and anywhere.

….it says in the release. The 8GB iPod touch will now be available for Rs12,400, 32GB model for Rs18,400 and 64GB model for Rs24,400.

Considering that the up coming PSP Go is expected to be priced around Rs18,000, Apple has an advantage. But gamers will go for PSP as of now because of the huge library of games available.

iPod shuffle price update

2GB model of the iPod shuffle will be now available for Rs3,700 and 4GB model for Rs4,800. Both the models come in silver, black, pink, blue and green.